Book Excerpt for the Day

    The first one hadn’t actually run, he’d walked.  The patrolman on the switchboard it was, and he said, “Sir, the phone’s gone dead.”

    “Oh?  We’d better call the phone company to fix it pronto,” the lieutenant said.  He liked the word “pronto,” it made him feel like Sean Connery.  He reached for the phone to call the phone company, but when he held it to his ear there wasn’t any sound.

    He became aware of the patrolman looking at him.  “Oh,” he said.  “Oh, yes.”  He put the phone back on its hook.

    (from The Hot Rock, by Donald E. Westlake)

     8*/10.  The full review is here.

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