garzey wing review

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During the 1950s, Gold Medal Books introduced authors like Jim Thompson, Chester Himes, and David Goodis to a mass readership eager for stories of lowlife and sordid crime. Today many of these writers are admired members of the literary canon, but one of the finest of them of all, Elliott Chaze, remains unjustly obscure. Now, for the first time in half a century, Chaze’s story of doomed love on the run returns to print in a trade paperback edition.

When Tim Sunblade escapes from prison, his sole possession is an infallible plan for the ultimate heist. Trouble is it’s a two-person job. So when he meets Virginia, a curiously well-spoken “ten-dollar tramp,” and discovers that the only thing she cares for is “drifts of money, lumps of it,” he knows he’s met his partner. What he doesn’t suspect is that this lavender-eyed angel might just prove to be his match. 

Black Wings Has My Angel careens through a landscape of desperate passion and wild reversals. It is a journey you will never forget.

Publisher ‏ : ‎ NYRB Classics; Reprint edition (January 19, 2016)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 224 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1590179161
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1590179161
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 8 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5 x 0.46 x 7.99 inches
Reviewer: Glenn Russell
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: A good friend of mine boldly asserts this isn’t a novel ...
Review: A good friend of mine boldly asserts this isn’t a novel to be read; this is a novel to be felt and a novel to be lived. After my own experience with Elliott Chaze's noir black angel, feeling its dramatic intensity and living through every single page with narrator Tim Sunblade and his beautiful babe Virginia, the slender, poised gal with skin the color of pearls melted in honey, I couldn’t agree more. In order to do such a powerful, complex book a measure of justice, a book spilling its guts out in insatiable greed, voracious gluttony, self-indulgent lusts and a ravenous craving for freedom and thrills, please read on.Tim Sunblade, the name he takes on as his tribute to a love of the great outdoors, is not only a big hunk of a good-looking tough-guy but a World War Two vet who served in the Pacific and still carries a piece of metal lodged in his skull. Tim is also an escaped convict from a Mississippi penitentiary, having been sent there in the first place after a tongue-thrashing by an FBI agent about making off with other people’s cars.Picture a man in 1953 who slapped down his quarters and dimes at the corner drug story for a copy of this recently published Gold Medal paperback. Chances are such a man was himself a war veteran and knew the intensity and toughness of battle and might even have had his own brush with the law. All this to say, a reader back then felt an immediate kinship with big, tough, adventurous Tim Sunblade when he spoke to men as intimates, addressing them directly, as in “Virginia had told me – did I tell you her name was Virginia?" and "You hear and read about legs. But when you see the really good ones, you know the things you read and heard where a lot of trash."Although we discover Tim’s real name along the way, no compelling reason to mention it here since Tim would like nothing more than to shove his past identity in an incinerator, watch it go up in smoke and be done with it forever. However, it is worth mentioning, wartime and jail-time gave Tim added layers of toughness beyond the likes of Chandler’s Philip Marlowe, Hammett’s Sam Spade and Cain’s Walter Huff. And since so much of noir revolves around violence, crime and the rough and tumble, this is one good reason to judge Black Wings Has My Angel, by far Elliott Chaze’s best novel, as a king of noir.Looking at the bigger picture, there’s no question all the returning veterans with their wartime experiences made a serious impact on American society and Tim Sunblade gave voice to what these men faced as civilians in postwar America. And if men supporting a wife and kids by working a dead-end job at the local factory or office or warehouse couldn’t have their own Tim Sunblade-style adventures at least they could read Chaze’s novel and live through Sunblade vicariously. Additionally, Black Wings can be read as a keen social commentary on the state of how American character and mythology played itself out during the 1950s in the home of the brave.Right up front in Chapter 3 Mississippi born and bred Tim gives us a little foreshadowing by getting down to some good old boy Southern philosophizing, telling us how facing death at his twenty-seven years isn’t that much different from dying as an old man since life, real life, is all about forgetting all the junk and living and remembering the delicious moments, and he has had plenty of delicious, luscious moments with Virginia. In this way, the stark reality and blackness of death coats every page we read from this point forward like ugly on an ape (cliché, I know, but in Tim's case it works).Tim Sunblade is a rebel with a cause and his rebellion is against staleness, routine and depending on anyone other than himself. Ah, the American myth of the self-made man, standing without any props, standing strong and tall. Here are Tim’s reflection on his knock-out, sexy babe as he speeds along the highway under an open sky: “I was all for dumping her along the way in a day or so. Now I didn’t know for sure, but I still thought I would, because a woman had no place in my plans.” Even as Tim’s heart pounds with more and more love for Virginia, all the rest of him screams for boundless freedom.Oh, Virginia! You femme fatale! Tim’s gorgeous lady is a study in contrasts, as refined and elegant as Lauren Bacall but with a wild-crazy-mad streak a mile long. Here she is after a successful big-time, masterful robbery: “She was scooping up handfuls of the green money and dropping it on top of her head so that it came sliding down along the cream-colored hair, slipping down along her shoulders and body. She was making a noise I never heard come out of a human being. It was a scream that was a whisper with a laugh that was a cry. Over and Over. The noise and the scooping. The slippery, sliding bills against her rigid body.”Interestingly, it was exactly the above scene that made the deepest impression on prepubescent Jean-Patrick Manchette, the author who would revitalize French crime fiction in the 1970s and have his slim, athletic, fetching thirty-year-old Aimée Joubert in Fatale take a bath with her own stolen bills. Black Wings, a serious novel with serious influence, and New York Review Books (NYRB)'s republication provides a great service in bringing this classic to a wider audience. The NYRB edition also includes a colorful introductory essay by Barry Gifford.“Virginia was in bed, all frou-froued up in a pink robe with some kind of white fur around the collar. The fur was so silky the air-conditioning made it move. She was eating a thick cube of a kind of candy they call Heavenly Hash in New Orleans, and now and again she took a straight raw sip of bourbon and turned the page of her book.” Did I mention greed, gluttony, lust, freedom and thrills? Black Wings is dripping with it. And since Virginia is such an huge part of each and every chapter, Elliott Chaze’s two hundred page angel is supercharged, a book that can be enjoyed nowadays by both men and women (I mention this since men were definitely the target audience back in 1953).

Reviewer: Annie ve Robert
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Good book
Review: Well written and interesting to read

Reviewer: Victoria Weisfeld
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: is a roller-coaster of a read—lightning fast and a lot of fun. At the outset
Review: A 2016 reissue, this noir crime novel by a Mississippi newspaperman, originally published in 1954, is a roller-coaster of a read—lightning fast and a lot of fun. At the outset, an escaped prisoner using the name Tim Sunblade has just finished a stint working on an oil drilling rig. To rid himself of four months of grime, he takes a nice long bath at a cheap hotel. The comforts of the bath put him in mind of having a little female companionship, and with the bellman’s aid he meets Virginia. They turn out to be quite a team.His plan is to head west (isn’t that the classic American criminal’s destination—the wide open spaces?). Virginia’s look and demeanor suggest she’s not just a hotel tramp, and eventually he learns she’s on the lam herself, fleeing the New York City cops.The book is full of sly dialog. When Tim discovers her call-girl past, Virginia tells him she used to “go with” various Army officers, who were always talking about “the big picture.” “Do I make it clear, Tim? About what is the big picture?” she asks. “You make it clear that your wartime activities were not on the enlisted level.”Virginia is accustomed to rolling in dough, literally, and more than a bit money-mad, so she encourages Tim’s plan to rob an armored car in Denver and dispose of it in an abandoned mine shaft they’ve found in the Rockies. Flush with their cash, they hit the road again until a drive through a small town turns out to be a big mistake.It’s a first-person narrative, and Chaze has captured the voice of Sunblade terrifically well. A bit bemused by life’s twists and turns, but resigned to them. Loving and hating Virginia in fairly equal amounts and never really trusting her. Too much whiskey and too many cigarettes.In the introduction to this reissue. Barry Gifford calls Black Wings a gem that still sparkles, and though author Chaze wrote several other novels, none of them stack up to it. A New Orleans native, Chaze worked for the Associated Press, served in the Second World War, then settled in Mississippi. He lived a time in Denver as well, which is perhaps why the book’s locations are so well drawn.He working in various capacities for The Hattiesburg American, for a decade as its city editor. His newspaper training shows in the economy and precision of his prose, and even when events are dire, the narrator’s detached view allows his wry humor to surface. Though Sunblade doesn’t often dwell on Life’s Larger Questions, I was struck by this observation: “Life is a rental proposition with no lease.” That’s exactly the kind of thing Tim Sunblade would say.I don’t give very many books five stars, but in this one, every word is perfect.

Reviewer: James H. Jenkins
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: I'd Give It Ten Stars, If I Could
Review: This is arguably the greatest pulp-noir novel ever written--or if it isn't, it's in the top three. Elliot Chaze spins a tale of two desperate people who meet by chance, hook up together for a volatile mixture of passion, betrayal, back-stabbing and even love, then set out to commit the perfect crime. And what's more, they succeed. Just like Billy Joe and Bobbi Sue in "Take the Money and Run," they get away with the money, and with stone-cold murder. There's just one little problem, and that problem--sung about once by the Kinks--ultimately destroys them both.

Reviewer: Howard Mandel
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Solid, lyrical noir
Review: There's drive in this tale of doom, and twists and turns that give it an extra punch, though its firmly in the school of hardboiled pulp a la Jim Thompson -- straightforward narrative of a heedless actor and his amoral amorata, making it big, going for broke. The writing isnt artsy, but feels real. Two good characters against themselves and each other.

Reviewer: A. Diamond
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Exceptional, Top-Notch Noir
Review: This is among the best of the best of noir and crime fiction. For starters, it's extraordinarily well written. The story is compelling, but the richness, complexity, and depth of the characters are what make this book stand out.The book was originally published in 1953, and is set in early 1950's Louisiana and Colorado. Timothy Sunblade is an escaped convict planning a major heist, but he needs a partner. Much to his surprise, he finds one in Virginia, the "ten dollar tramp" that the bellhop brings to his hotel room. I won't give away any plot details, but I will say this book is up there with the best of Jim Thompson, and is even more haunting in some ways. If you're looking for a really good read, this is it.

Reviewer: Vikash Goyal
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Elliott Chaze's - Black Wings Has My AngelRating - 4.5/5An enigmatic hustler enchants a runaway convict - this sounds like just another novel on smitten love and desires. The ones you find written all the time, everywhere. But, this is a diamond in the rough...Chaze's cult noir fiction comes with a taste for the unfathomable. Just when one thinks the book has surprised one enough, one falls in the "bottomless pit" of beautiful writing and strong plot. The writing is conversational and hence, the author speaks to the reader directly....As is the case with noir fiction, the characters are dark and broken, and often find themselves on the wrong side of the law. The protagonist and antagonists are one and the same. This is where Chaze scores a home run. The brave, bad and volatile characters are lovable yet detestable. The reality of human behaviour is painted in perfect hues...The picturesque writing will take the reader on a ride of imagery through beautiful and varied landscapes...For a wonderful experience...yes!

Reviewer: Chris Elliott
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Well if you like Noir literature you will love this, it's the darkest of Noir. Published during the golden age of Noir in the 1950's this is recognised as one of the best. This is noir in its purest form, a cropped down, hard boiled mystery.Timothy Sunblade is an escaped convict, a car thief and a war veteran and has a permanent head injury which makes him somewhat unstable. After meeting Virginia a 'ten dollar tramp' and femme fatale the two lovers travel west in a convertible plotting an armoured car heist (so long as Timothy doesn't dump her at the side of the road first...) and the story goes from there.Chaze is a master writer and his prose is chillingly intoxicating and he is a master of the genre's seedy coolness. The relationship between the lead characters feels real and meaningful and the dialogue crackles, threatening to combust. If you don't like this you don't like Noir. Enjoy all!

Reviewer: Gato 520
Rating: 2.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: some have called it a lost noir masterpiece. not me. 3rd rate james m cain