The cast for this opera of hitmen is different. So many of the hired guns are women. "So many of them?" How many professional killers are there lurking in the wings of Victor Gischler's blood-soaked black satire? Well, let's say enough to form a jury of their peers. Everyone seems to want to do others in, including each other, and the lead-laced fireworks start when three enterprising youths see something they weren't supposed to.

It was just a way to make a few bucks for Andrew Foley and his pals Vincent and Anthony Minelli. True, the job was a little weird but some things you just don't trust to the union hands. With the Minelli cousins you don't have to worry about the law, and Andrew Foley is willing to go along with his wise-guys-in-training pals because of a money-deficit and an easy job. All the team has to do is shepherd a cargo container from an arriving vessel to an unused warehouse on the other end of the docks so that the contents can be off-loaded without going through customs. And, for the thousand bucks apiece, it's understood that silence is part of the job.

What goes wrong is that they hang around playing cards too long after the container is moved. They weren't supposed to see the guy inside when he breaks out. But what's worse is that "Jamaal 1-2-3," as the turbaned terrorist is known, sees them seeing him. That's unacceptable and he's freaking out. When he reports it to his unknown contact at the other end of the phone number he's been carrying, the first of the hitmen is called into play. The boys are going to be paid in lead.

The ace killer that the "broker" contracts for the hit is in top physical condition and knows more about light armaments than some generals. Nicki Enders can also look like a hip young corporate lawyer when she needs to. And, the person the broker considers "the most dangerous woman in the world" is nothing but very bad news to Andrew Foley and the Minellis.

Andrew, alerted to the danger, has one option for escape. On his death bed, Dan Foley, his father, told him that if his ass is ever on the line, meaning life-or-death trouble, and in need of a refuge, the one man he could turn to would be his uncle Mike, one of the most fearsome hitmen of his day. Mike is now retired and living a new life on a refuge of his own, a small vineyard in Oklahoma. After all these years and miles from his old Harlem killing ground, the last voice Mike expected to hear on the phone was Dan's son's.

Not exactly a criminal whiz kid, Andrew drops one clue too many to his friend Vincent before he flees the city and, after enjoying farmyard chores with Unc' for a few weeks, here comes Meredith Cornwall-Jenkins in a Cayuse helicopter that she "appropriated" from the local Air National Guard. She drops in on Mike's remote valley hideout like a banshee from hell, bombing and strafing and literally wiping the spread off the map, if it were ever on one. But, whoa, who's this Meredith Cornwall-Jenkins? Well, she's Nicki Enders' sister. Nicki, it turns out, is losing her taste for the occupation and sub-contracted the job to her skillful sibling.

Things don't go so well, but not to worry. The chain of hired guns is long and resourceful. The broker, a guy by the name of Louie Ortega, now needs to cover his ass and puts Nicki in Enrique Mars' crosshairs. And, eventually, Nicki is going to spring her littlest sis, 18-year old Elizabeth, aka, Lizzy, from the institution in order to find out what happened to Meredith. Then there's the three sisters' addle-brained mom, who wields knitting needles like Ninja swords. Finally (perhaps), the team of Jack Sprat and mighty Mavis are coming to take care of pesky survivors.

For us mystery-thriller addicts, we survive Victor Gischler's satiric opera without need for translation. It's in the familiar lingo of fever-paced action, staccato rhythms of bullets and buckshot, dark characters to die for, and what the author calls in one of his segments, "The Trimphant Return of a Coldhearted Son of a Bitch." Prime stuff, and as antically entertaining as anything spewing out of the fun-crime barrel of someone like Elmore Leonard except, perhaps, for more powder burns.

                                                ~~ Jules Brenner