Jimmy the Stick

August 13, 2012
The 1932 Lindbergh baby kidnapping provides the backdrop for film expert Mayo’s gritty first novel. Jimmy Quinn, who has a long record on the wrong side of the law, admits, “I’ve been a thief, a bootlegger, a bagman.... I was in on the fix of a World Series.” After the abduction of the aviator’s son, an old friend of Quinn’s, Walter Spencer—who’s gone straight—summons Quinn to his New Jersey home. Spencer’s wife is frantic that their little Ethan will be the next child snatched. Since Spencer has some imminent out-of-state business travel, Quinn agrees to keep Ethan safe and secure. Another attempt to kidnap a child and the nailing of a man to a tree raise the ante. Mayo (American Murder: Criminals, Crime, and the Media) persuasively portrays such real-life mobsters as Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano in a tale sure to appeal to fans of Max Allan Collins’s gangster historicals. Agent: Agnes Birnbaum, Bleecker Street Associates.