Smalltime

Utilitarian prose and a plot gently underscored with irony work together to wonderful effect in this debut British crime novel. Chris, who lives at a YMCA in suburban London, gets mugged making the nightly deposit for the liquor store where he works. Dashy is the hapless mugger who gets away--without the cash. Chris tracks Dashy down at a local bookie's but not before Dashy has told his tale to another unemployed fellow named Kevin. With more brains than Dashy, Kevin takes charge as the twosome make plans for further escapades. But Chris and Dashy are also talking to each other by now. In the meantime, a laid-back copper named Morgan monitors the whole situation. Chris finds two new women: Liz at the bus stop and Rachel where he works. Kevin takes up with Eunice at the local pub. The author sets his tale in an unremarkable setting and inserts an easy, insidious criminality into three drab and seemingly uneventful lives. Smalltime is a finely crafted study of transitions--between city and suburb, between youth and adulthood, and between getting by and going under. With the addition of a prose flourish or two, Raine could easily join the ranks of John Harvey and Michael Dibdin. (Apr.)