Train (Vintage Contemporaries) - Softcover

"Extraordinary.... This masterful book is such a formidable achievement, it creates its own frame of reference. Other writers must now be measured against Pete Dexter." -- San Francisco Chronicle

"Dexter is a superb writer. . . . The narrative flows and weaves, dips and dances like a boxer in a championship bout." -- The Oregonian

"Spectacular, explosive...Mythic, comic and tragic, Train yields a treasure trove of harsh human wisdom." -- St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"With an exhilarating crime novel that mixes race, sex, murder-and yes, golf-Pete Dexter hits a hole in one." --Newsweek

"A beautiful, stomach-churning novel, full of graphic descriptions and brutal plot turns. . . . Dexter's dark, hypnotic writing is in top form." -- The Plain Dealer

"Riveting. . . . Brilliantly observed and psychologically incisive. . . . Confirms Dexter's place as the most lapidary American prose stylist since Hemingway." --The Philadelphia Inquirer

"Chilling. . . . Haunting. . . . Dexter's writing is a living thing." --USA Today

"Dexter gets violence on paper with a harsh precision, and the pages turn with a potboiler's fleetness. When the final boom rumbles, readers are likely to be up well past their bedtimes." --The New York Times Book Review

"Disturbingly magnificent. . . . As brutal as anything James Ellroy has rolled out. . . . Dexter crawls inside his characters to peel back the darkest ids." --Los Angeles Times Book Review

"Memorable. . . . Stylish and sinewy. . . . Dexter is an irresistibly fluid and engaging writer." --Newsday

"The strength of the novel lies far beyond its noirish setting or graphic plot twists. It is rather in Dexter's assured and direct handling of the ever-tangled subject of how ordinary people try to ford the nation's racial divide in pursuit of, or in flight from, deeper human truths." --Washington Post Book World

"Utterly gripping. . . . A superbly written book. . . . Illuminated by vivid flashes of humor and humanity. . . . Cunningly structured for maximum impact." --The Economist

"Taut, tight and unrelenting, this is Dexter's best novel since his National Book Award-winning Paris Trout. . . . . It's mean, tough, tender, and emotionally, and conceptually, highly charged." --Houston Chronicle

"Visceral, like a punch to the gut. . . . A gutty, gritty gem of a novel. . . . Dexter masterfully builds the suspense and each unwholesome character bounces off the other as the novel wends toward denouement. . . . This is Dexter in top noir form, as only he can pull it off." --The Denver Post

"Exquisite, painful. . . . He's the Faulkner of our time; just when you've passed judgment on a character, Dexter pulls the rug out from under you. . . . . You think you understand fear and race? Read Train." --Los Angeles Times

"Brilliant. . . . A strange and riveting book." --San Jose Mercury News

"Engrossing. . . . It's easy to get lost in Dexter's beautifully constructed sentences. Their attention to detail, their careful rhythms and brutal observations make Train satisfying to read. . . . It revels in its hardboiled dialogue and Chandleresque cadences, its sudden violence and cheeky humor." --Fort Worth Star-Telegram

"Extreme noir. . . . Dexter's prose is muscular, dead-pan, hard-boiled." --Seattle Post-Intelligencer

"Don't expect some triumph-of-the-underdog sports story. . . . Dexter's vision of golf as a stark, brutal confrontation-with-self is unlike anything depicted on a sports page. . . . In his lean, powerful style, [he] digs into the complex dangers of race and love. And anyone who expects Dexter to keep it simple might as well tell the cat not to eat the birds." --The Miami Herald

"Takes the reader on a mesmerizing ride aboard a fast-moving Train." --The Orlando Sentinel

"Dexter's novels . . . tend to inhabit thriller country, but their dark lyricism and an inspired disregard for traditional plot carry them beyond this generic territory. . . . Dexter's skill resides in keeping an atmosphere of menace close to the surface at all times, so that violent collision of the worlds surrounding Packard seems inevitable." --The New Yorker

"Compelling. . . . Raw. . . . Train is the work of an American master at the top of his game." --Elle (Reader's Prize)

"Powerful. . . . In Packard, Dexter has created a flawed tough-guy hero, 'the kind of man who would hurt you'--yet one who transcends the hard-boiled-thriller model with his uncommon sensitivity to others' emotions and a self-awareness that his romantic idealism will probably lead to his own ruin. Grade: A." --Entertainment Weekly

"Dexter is a skilled writer who knows how to set the scene." --Pittsburg Post-Gazette

"Its period [are] details searing, its shifts of mood as remorseless as the Santa Ana wind." --Daily News

"Quick-witted, muscular and to the point. . . . The characters are tough, the words tougher." --The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Superb. . . . Taut. . . . Rich in imagery." --People

"Intense and moving. . . . Dexter shows the light in the human soul mostly by contrasting it with the dark. . . . [Train] contains plenty of scenes of brutality and violence, but also passages of beauty and tenderness and clarity." --Philadelphia Magazine

"Pete Dexter fans, rejoice: The wait is over. . . . He writes with an accuracy and power that leave you wishing the book were longer." --The Dallas Morning News

Quietly navigating his way between his hostile patrons and brutal fellow workers in 1953 Los Angeles, African-American caddy Train finds an unexpected ally in a police detective who encourages Train's ambitions and oversees a case involving a boat hijacking and a beautiful widow. Reader's Guide available. Reprint. 50,000 first printing.