Started off strong but petered out about before the end. Had trouble connecting to the characters as well.

When I first began reading this book, I felt that it did get off to a decent start, however, unfortunately, the author totally dropped the balls soon after. Filled with excessive vularity, I could not finish it. Sadly, this book was not for me.

I'm not doing well with books by this author. This book just drops off in places. It mainly says, gambling is bad and we know that. It's hard, if not impossible to connect to the characters and what I'd hoped would be a good plot, fell short of that mark. This is the second book by this author and I'm sorry to say these books are working for me.

My copy came via Net Galley. My review is my own, my thoughts and feelings. I have left this review because I said I would.

I chose not to give this a rating as it just did not appeal to me. I recognize the author has talent.
The story is gritty, sometimes graphically vulgar. It is darkly atmospheric and the description of his choice regarding the dog is only a minor piece of this story.

Book Review: The Fix by Robert Downs
Review by Dawn Thomas


Pages
Publisher: Black Open Books Publication

General Fiction

Johnny Chapman has the worst luck. He is a gambler who has not won in a while and owes a lot of money to Harrison. Harrison makes Johnny an offer, inject a dog with a hormone to fix a race or else. Johnny takes the needle and heads to the track but once he looks into the dog’s eyes, he knows he cannot do it.

Gwendoline Pearce is in a similar situation. She has just lost her job and her husband is having an affair with a perky young blonde-haired woman with pouty lips. When Johnny crosses her path, neither of their lives will be the same.

The book is written in third person present tense and was a fast read. I actually read the book twice. Although it is classified as a mystery & thriller, there is little mystery in the book. The story is full of action, drugs, cursing, and violence. I usually enjoy this type of book but I could not connect with any of the characters. They seems shallow and were not well developed. The author also eludes to a relationship between Johnny and Gwendoline but does not go into detail.

This novella sucks you in with what appears to be incredibly good writing. However well-constructed the language, if it doesn't tell a coherent story, something is definitely lacking. The first two thirds of THE FIX reads like a series of disjointed vignettes where each one paints a vivid picture that never quite reveals the intended theme. There are paragraphs that read like the voiceover in film noir; you can almost hear Bogart reading the lines.

There are three main characters Johnny, Gwendoline and Harrison. There are also innumerable nameless characters that somewhat hard to track, yet are integral to the action in their particular scenes.

As much as I want to praise the prose, I also want to pan the plot. It isn't until the last couple of chapters that a coherent story materializes.

Reading THE FIX is much like attending a film festival of short noir themed movies with no intermission.

I wanted to like this book. However, it didn't "pull me in." The background information, building of the story's unique "world", and suspense were nice. Yet, they were not enough to yank my attention from other things.

Wasn't sure what to expect, I chose this more about the idea that a bad guy would have a soft spot for a dog that for the story. In fact, there is very little about the dog other than how cute he was. He is save, and the cost of the dog's safety is incredible danger from the protagonist, who is an ambivalently a good guy, who is attempting, with few other choices, to pay off a gambling debt.
The girl, long suffering abuse victim and former girlfriend of the gambler, crosses his path accidentally and revisits their past and gets dragged into his current drama.
The writing was actually quite good, but I really didn't care once I knew the dog was safe.

Original and enthralling. A journey of a gamblers problems and how he tries to “fix” them.

Johnny is a drunk and a gambler. He is not particularly good at either and now owes a large amount of money to Harrison. Harrison wants Johnny to fix a dog race as repayment of the gambling losses. Johnny doesn’t. He does a number of foolish things in order to extricate himself from the situation in which he finds himself. People are killed and he is kicked and beaten more than once. The climax is almost anticlimactic. Thanks to Net Galley and Black Opal Books for an ARC for an honest review.

Johnny Chapman, the protagonist of The Fix by Robert Downs, is a perfect example of noir characters. He is a self-destructive, alcoholic gambler always looking for the next big win. His first problem is that he is a terrible gambler and his second--he's in debt to a loan shark for a huge amount of money. The loan shark's solution is for Johnny to fix a dog race by killing the favorite. Johnny's conscience prohibits him from carrying out the plan. Now the loan shark is after Chapman to even the score. This novella would make a great short feature film.

2 stars

Gambler Johnny Chapman is on a big losing streak. When he gets in too deep with a loan shark, they tie him to a chair and beat him. Then they offer him a proposition. He is to drug a consistently winning dog in a big race. No problem, right?

When he gets to the dog, he finds he simply can’t do it. Instead, he goes on the run with the bad guys chasing him.

The charter Johnny Chapman has few redeeming qualities as his girlfriend is most likely to say. (She’s not a real winner herself.) He’s the true essence of a loser who has things happen to him. He seems to have little control over his life – or his decisions.

What one can say about this book is perhaps look out for the danger inherent in all addictions. The writing is not bad, and the plot is interesting to a degree. I didn’t like Johnny very much and I would guess that that affects my opinion of the book. His only good quality was that he had affection for the dog.

I want to thank NetGalley and Independent Book Publishers Association (IPBA), Members Titles for forwarding a copy of this book for me to read.

While this book did get off to a strong start, the author dropped the ball not long after. It seems that the author has an obsession with the word 'bastard'. Every few pages you run across it. This book was not for me.

Johnny Chapman was a professional gambler. Seems he would have been better off in another profession, because his losing streak and debts owed to the local loan shark are going to get him killed. The way his luck has been going, it won’t be quick or painless, although he has been offered an out. Once again, Johnny is about to find himself on the receiving end of trouble, but this time, it’s because he did the right thing, just a little too late.

Johnny is that guy who is looking for the fast buck, the easy buck, and can’t see he has a problem, even after his ex-girlfriend repeatedly reminds him what a loser he is. THE FIX by Robert Downs is short read that really plays out like a fly’s eye view of the downfall of one more victim of a total lack of control in a world of vultures just looking for that lame, baby bird who wants to play with the big boys’ league. Probably a good thing he is confident he can take a punch or fifty…

Lots of action, turmoil and a character who makes life a lot harder than it is, I had to wonder if Johnny would get wise before he got dead! I can't say I felt much for Johnny or his girlfriend, but the dog, definitely!

I received a complimentary review copy from Black Opal Books.

Publisher: Black Opal Books (December 2, 2017)
Publication Date: December 2, 2017
Genre: Crime Fiction
Print Length: 103 pages
Available from: Amazon | Barnes & Noble
For Reviews & More: http://tometender.blogspot.com

Very interesting read about a gambler and him gambling with money that does not belong to him, leading to a series of unfortunate events. It’s a noire novella and moves at a fast paced. Highly recommended.

Thanks to Netgalley, author and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This novella is a noir - morally ambiguous characters operating in a dark, foreboding atmosphere of cynicism and fatalism.

I do love the noir genre, but prefer it when the main protagonist has, despite all his shortcoming, a sliver of stubborn nobility to navigate this morally bankrupt world and a steely resolve to tackle the odds so stacked against him.

These are not stories with happy endings, but there is generally some form of resolution in the end.

In this novella, Johnny unashamedly has very few redeemable qualities, so I really struggled to be invested in him and the story itself. Moreover, the novella essentially consists of a series of unfortunate events that are mostly self-perpetuated.

In the end, there wasn't really any resolution, it all just seemed rather pointless.

The author reminded me why I don't prefer to gamble. I hate to lose! Am I the only one? More precisely, I wouldn't want to lose some gangster's money hell-bent of taking it out on my hide. This character-driven narrative moved along at the speed of a bullet. In fact, it came down to many at the end.

Professional gambler Johnny Chapman had found himself on the flip side of winning. Not a good place to be. Especially, when the money he lost wasn't his. He'd overextended himself with a bundle of cash to loan shark, Harrison Barrymore. Bad news for Johnny - his loan's been called in.

Turns out Harrison's not such a bad fellow after all. Softened up while tied to a chair, Johnny had been given an ultimatum: either fix a dog race or die. Will it be box number one or box number two? That was an easy one. The fix was in. After being untied, Harrison handed him a syringe filled with some type of liquid. An injection ensured a less-than-stellar performance for the canine champion. Now all that was left was to stick the dog. No problem. Right?

Race day had come. Shortly before post time, Johnny found the kennel where the dog was being kept. Surprisingly, he got in with no problems. Supermax it wasn't. So far so good. The Moment of Truth came when he found the dog. Everything went to pieces when he looked into the soft brown eyes of the racing champion. His ship was sunk. No way he could slip that dog a Mickey. All he could do was hope for the best, plan for the worst. A silent prayer was made to the god of dog racing. Second place - second place.

From The spectator stands, he watched the incredible four-legged athlete bolt to another first-place finish. There is no God. Looks like he's stuck with box number two. With Harrison's goons on his tail, another race was underway. Survival. Only there's no finish line.

My appreciation sent to NetGalley and Black Opal Books for this Arc in exchange for an unbiased review.