The Gunman

"The Gunman," is now a major motion picture directed by Pierre Morel and starring Sean Penn, Javier Bardem, Idris Elba and Ray Winstone. Martin Terrier is a hired killer who wants out of the game, so he can settle down and marry his childhood sweetheart. But the Organization won't let him go: they h [...]
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"The Gunman," is now a major motion picture directed by Pierre Morel and starring Sean Penn, Javier Bardem, Idris Elba and Ray Winstone. Martin Terrier is a hired killer who wants out of the game, so he can settle down and marry his childhood sweetheart. But the Organization won't let him go: they have other plans for him. In a violent tale that shatters as many illusions as bodies, Jean-Patrick Manchette subjects his characters and the reader alike to a fierce exercise in style. This tightly plotted, corrosive parody of "the success story" is widely considered to be Manchette's masterpiece, and was named a "New York Times" "Notable Book" in 2002. "The Gunman" is a classic of modern noir. Also available in its original edition titled "The Prone Gunman," along with Manchette's "Three to Kill," published by City Lights in 2002. "There's not a superfluous word or overdone effect . . . one of the last cool, compact and shockingly original crime novels Manchette left as his legacy to modern noir fiction." -- "New York Times" "This is lean, mean noir fiction that cleverly sends up the tough guy genre while incarnating it perfectly." -- "Detroit Free Press" "Manchette is a master of both economy and irony. Brutal and bracing: Terrier's tale fascinates even as it chills." -- "Kirkus Reviews" "For Manchette and the generation of writers who followed him, the crime novel is no mere entertainment, but a means to strip bare the failures of society, ripping through veils of appearance, deceit, and manipulation to the greed and violence that are the society's true engines." -- "Boston Globe" "Jean-Patrick Manchette's terse prose moves like the swift, almost automatic methods and mannerisms of his protagonist." -- "Wall Street Journal"