The Taker in Time Out New York

This week’s Time Out New York has a great four star review — out of six, but still, a four-star review — by Anderson Tepper of Rubem Fonseca’s The Taker and Other Stories.

In short, fragmented vignettes that ring with the hard-boiled edge of crime fiction. Fonseca, 83, has charted his own territory, a Third World nightmare of random violence and anomie, festering rage and class resentment. In stories like “The Taker” and “Happy New Year,” assassins pick out their prey among wealthy partygoers before casually and remorselessly cutting them down to size. (Literally, too—this book is rife with scenes of mutilation, in which body parts often end up stuffed into boxes and briefcases.)