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A review by rosseroo
Angel Baby by Richard Lange
4.0
Picked this up after thoroughly enjoying Lange's debut short-story collection, and then his LA crime novel "This Wicked World." This one is set in Tijuana and nearby border area, and then up in Los Angeles. It's got a pretty simple setup -- a young beautiful woman is the captive wife of a terrifying narco boss in Tijuana and set out to make her escape to Los Angeles with $500,000 to start a new new life with the 4-year-old daughter she left up there.
Three men are soon involved: El Apache is a former narco trying to go straight who is set on the trail of the wife by the boss, and the stakes for his success or failure are very high. Malone is a loser alcoholic from San Diego who makes ends meet smuggling people across the border in car trunks. Finally, there's a corrupt Border Patrol agent with a gambling problem who sees a possible way out of his current tight spot.
It all unfolds like a relentless chase film -- with Lange's usual attention to vivid details that put the reader deeply into each scene, whether it's a shootout in a dusty canyon, a dingy motel room, or a hectic amusement center. I found the characters here a little too one-dimensional for a book, and the theme of family perhaps slightly overdone. But I could easily imagine this working quite well as a film, and it's hard to imagine this won't end up as a movie at some point.
Three men are soon involved: El Apache is a former narco trying to go straight who is set on the trail of the wife by the boss, and the stakes for his success or failure are very high. Malone is a loser alcoholic from San Diego who makes ends meet smuggling people across the border in car trunks. Finally, there's a corrupt Border Patrol agent with a gambling problem who sees a possible way out of his current tight spot.
It all unfolds like a relentless chase film -- with Lange's usual attention to vivid details that put the reader deeply into each scene, whether it's a shootout in a dusty canyon, a dingy motel room, or a hectic amusement center. I found the characters here a little too one-dimensional for a book, and the theme of family perhaps slightly overdone. But I could easily imagine this working quite well as a film, and it's hard to imagine this won't end up as a movie at some point.