EPIC HISTORICAL CRIME IN JUST OVER 200 PAGES: JACK SONNI'S SAGAMORE

Sagamore came to my attention from two of my favorite authors and people , Ace Atkins and William Boyle.They both knew Jack Sonni, who mainly spent his time as a professional musician playing in and with Dire Straits and Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers. This posthumous novel feels like John Sayles channeling Dashiell Hammett and argues that Sonni could have been a great novelist as well.

The title setting is a Pennsylvania mining town in 1932.where the body of Markle, the much hated local game warden, is found with a Jack Of Spades stuck on his forehead. Sheriff Johnson knows this will stir up a lot of trouble. Markle harassed a lot of the Italian miners who shot at birds to blow off steam and there were rumors he had gambling debts owed to The Black Hand. With the miners anger at the working conditions and low pay from the company alreading packing a powder keg, this could be the fuse.

Much like Richard Price, Sonni uses the crime to explore the community, in this case two communities. Sonni travels back a few days and follow the lead up to the murder with many of the enemies Markle made, then follow the ripples of the aftermath involving the law, the lawless, workers, and those who move in between. The story finds its center in Corky a young miner yearning to break from the company town. His latest run in with Markle force him to o to Gina, Forraro, a widow who runs a boarding house for the miners and has Black Hand connections. As sheriff Johnson's investigation heats up and a big reveal occurs in the story, Corky and Sal, a Mafia torpedo brought in from Pittsburg, high tail it out of town. They land in Rosedale. Mississippi where they get involved with Sarafina, an Italian juke waitress, and a robbery that goes violently wrong, taking them back to Sagamore for the conclusion.

Sonni demonstrates less of a lyrical style found in many musician-turned-authors. It leans toward a punchier, hard boiled approach, that reflects traditional blues. He did possess a balladeer's capacity to capture the traits and and history of a character in a concise manner. By connecting each of them and their biographies he creates a vivid, tactile mosaic of Sagamore and Rosedale and tells an epic tale He sharply communicates an epic story with paperback economy.

Two of the most complex and formidable characters are the main women. Gina carries deep history that may involve the murder of her husband. She's learned to operate between the working and criminal class that provides the the closest form of justice with deft ambiguity. Sarafina is woman drawn by ambition, who holds onto the American dream with a vengeance. Both women have learned to navigate the violent world of men to survive and get grab the opportunities that come. I would have loved to have seen what the author would have done with them in their own stories.

I would have loved to have seen a lot more from Jack Sonni. Sagamore shows the talent he possessed to bring a story to life through those who inhabit it. Thanks to publisher Cool Dog Sound, we have this hard evidence of his skills.