Name: Out of Sight
Rating: 4 (3 reviews)

Elmore Leonard

Scott Frank

Out of Sight

Tim Pendry

It is already amazing to think that this thriller is nearly fifteen years old. There's not much to say about it other than it is expertly plotted, finely written and crisp. Leonard has a remarkable ability to evoke place and real human interaction. The question with this sort of book is why we should be interested in dim-witted sociopaths with attention deficit disorder - 'misfits trying not to sound like losers' as the book puts it near the end. The answer is, of course, that we shouldn't particularly - the persons are always less interesting than the plot. Leonard only makes them interesting by attempting to have the not-so-bad dimwits with some marginal sense of honour live the American myth, referencing their lives back to a simple Hollywood ethic. On this score, 'Out of Sight' nearly did not get its five stars because of the completely romantic and absurd relationship between the hero, Jack Foley, an aging bank robber who does not want to do the time for his crimes, and a somewhat stereotyped daddy's girl female Federal Marshal. The central scene in this relationship is just the fantasy of a late middle aged male and little more than that, even if it evokes that fantasy with consummate skill. But I relented on the basis that the ridiculousness of it only requires the same suspension of disbelief that any 'classic' Hollywood romantic crime movie might require. The referencing of the legend of Dillinger and to 'Bonnie &amp; Clyde' and other genre films shows a certain sad knowingness about the role of the outlaw myth in American individualism that points up all the better to the reader the harsh reality of blundering third rate minds trying to grab what they can within a chaotic system. A lot of male readers will part-identify with Jack Foley (and is that not a quintessential masculine outlaw name!?) as those who compromised with that system for the sake of security. The outcome is a nice little morality tale for the Middle American male - you made the right choice in the end even if you never got to feel as alive as Jack must have done when he was younger. Whatever the use made of thrillers like these by Hollywood, their cultural role is a fundamentally conservative one, albeit with a nod to the radical freedom that is just around the corner and for which most men pine so long as there are no costs or consequences. It took time to appreciate Elmore Leonard's genius in this book as the plot was being set up but by the end there was no doubt of it.

Before there was Raylan, there was Sisco... U.S. Marshal Karen Sisco is on the hunt for world-class gentleman felon Jack Foley in Out of Sight, New York Times bestselling author Elmore Leonard’s sexy thriller that moves from Miami to the Motor City. Based on Miami, Florida's Gold Coast, U.S. Marshal Karen Sisco isn’t about to let a expert criminal like Jack Foley successfully bust out of Florida's Glades Prison. But there’s a major score waiting for him in Detroit, and a shotgun-wielding marshal isn’t going to stop Foley from getting it. Neither counted on sharing a cramped car trunk—or on a sizzling chemistry that’s working overtime. As soon as Sisco escapes, Foley is already missing her. Sisco can’t forget Foley either—and she isn’t about to let him go. Too bad the next time their paths cross, it’s going to be about business, not pleasure.

A Novel

Jeff James

A prison break in South Florida brings together two different people--federal marshal Karen Sisco and bank robber Jack Foley--and it leads them to the heist of the year in Detroit and a confrontation with brutal criminals specializing in home invasion.

Out of Sight

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