Hard Man

Acerbic wit leavens over-the-top violence in Scottish author Guthrie's third ""tartan noir"" (after Edgar-finalist Kiss Her Goodbye). Jacob Baxter's married 16-year-old daughter, May, is pregnant with another man's baby; May's 26-year-old husband, Wallace, is a karate expert and in a seething jealous rage. To protect May, Jacob, along with grown sons Rog and Flash, confront Wallace, and none of the Baxters emerges unscathed. Their next idea is to enlist the aid of a local ""hard man,"" and they reach out to loner ex-con Pearce (who appeared in Guthrie's first novel, Two-Way Split). After inflicting still more injuries on the Baxter clan, Pearce refuses to help, and the Baxters continue to wage a decidedly inept war against Wallace. The violence is nonstop and intense (Wallace crucifies a man-literally), but Guthrie makes the macabre funny. When Pearce finally gets involved, the story goes off the rails, but Guthrie contrives to make the hapless, hopeless Baxters into something more than mere cartoons, and their bungled blood feud is grotesquely fascinating.