David Gordon has an exotic and wonderfully checkered career, particularly when it comes to all things written. His history regarding the latter includes a couple of stand-alone works and a collection of short stories that have helped to confer upon him the rarefied status of being a “writer’s writer.” THE BOUNCER, his newly published crime novel, feels like the introduction to a series. I certainly hope so. The characters and situations --- resolved and otherwise --- are much too interesting and intriguing to be lost to the ether.

Joe Brody is the bouncer of the title, a complex character who defies expectations and stereotypes. He is a well-read strip club peace enforcer who reads high literary classics when things are quiet at his place of employment. But when things get nasty, he is not above judiciously using force when he must while utilizing persuasion when he can. This is demonstrated to good effect in the opening pages. Gordon drops fact nuggets about Brody’s background throughout the third person narrative that informs the story, occasionally telling but usually showing.

"THE BOUNCER is loaded with interesting, quirky characters who are just different enough from those one usually encounters in a crime novel to shoulder its way to the top of your reading list."

Joe is not above earning a dishonest dollar, and it is that propensity that lands him in a bit of trouble when a plan to hijack a truckload of firearms goes terribly wrong, thanks to an informant who decides to play both ends against the middle. When the dust settles and the smoke clears, Joe is on the run, with a quietly sexy FBI agent after him without her quite knowing it, while an Asian gang lord seeks mistaken retribution against him.

Meanwhile, Joe’s friend and employer is a Mafioso head named Gio Caprisi, who has a snake bag full of his own complications and complexities. Gio has an idea to get the FBI and other federal and local law enforcement agencies off his back and away from his strip club business interests, and presents his plan to the other crime organizations that call Queens and the surrounding environs their own. It is audacious enough that it just might work. Joe, of course, is more concerned about staying alive. If he can live through the last quarter of the book, which is one long, violent chase through a shopping mall and residential complex (and worth the price of admission all by itself), we just might see a sequel.

THE BOUNCER is loaded with interesting, quirky characters who are just different enough from those one usually encounters in a crime novel to shoulder its way to the top of your reading list. Joe Brody is first among equals in this regard, but Gio Caprisi runs a close second, what with his strip clubs and the unique manner in which he cooks the books. Gordon has garnered critical acclaim for his previously published fiction but deserves more notice in the public eye. This may be the book that provides that impetus. And somebody in the video industry needs to read it as well.