Scan barcode
missyjohnson's review against another edition
3.0
wish that I could rate 3.5 stars. dual time period books that alternate chapters are ok if well done. this one is well done. I did find myself skipping a chapter to see what was going to happen without the flashback/current time frame set up. The information on picking locks was very interesting. the revealing of what happened to Michael was also very well done. My interest was piqued and I wanted to see what would happen to this young man. The way the rest of the book played out did follow the "no honor among thieves" theme.
klparmley's review
3.0
This was a really good book and not the kind of thing I usually listen to. Mostly because I haven't known how to find it, I think. This is a straight up, modern fiction.
I found this one because I like the narrator. He has read a series I liked and I was hoping that what he likes to read is stuff that I like to listen to. I wasn't disappointed.
I became fond of the characters. I like Mike and would invite him to dinner. I'm still wondering what's going on with his uncle, Lido. By the time I found out what caused him to lose his voice, I was too wrapped up in the story to "look away" from the bad stuff. But there was another part where I had to pause and catch my breath before I could finish.
I will be looking for more by Steve Hamilton.
I found this one because I like the narrator. He has read a series I liked and I was hoping that what he likes to read is stuff that I like to listen to. I wasn't disappointed.
I became fond of the characters. I like Mike and would invite him to dinner. I'm still wondering what's going on with his uncle, Lido. By the time I found out what caused him to lose his voice, I was too wrapped up in the story to "look away" from the bad stuff. But there was another part where I had to pause and catch my breath before I could finish.
I will be looking for more by Steve Hamilton.
thart3's review against another edition
3.0
The sad tale of a young boy who loses the ability to speak, and because of his loneliness is guided into a life of crime. I enjoyed reading this one.
holmstead's review against another edition
5.0
This book was awesome! Just awesome. It has everything: suspense, humor, sadness, heroism. It was absolutely captivating. Michael was a great character. He was someone you could root for, feel sorry for, and also want to slap the poor kid and say "what the hell are you thinkin'?" But his actions speak volumes, all for good reason. The rest of the characters can be summed up perfectly: The good, the bad, and the ugly. I will definitely be putting more of Steve Hamilton's work on my tbr shelf.
readingjag's review against another edition
3.0
Solid 3 stars, my eyes glazed over during all the technical bits on lockpicking though.
rmarcin's review against another edition
4.0
Well, looks like I read this in 2011 - no recollection of that!
This is the story of a young boy who is rendered mute after a horrific instance in his life when he was quite young. We don't find out the actual event until very late in the book.
Michael is a talented artist as well as someone who is very adept at picking locks. This lock-picking talent gets him involved with a seedy crowd. Along the way, he meets Amelia, who is also an artist. Through pictures they tell their story to each other.
It is told mainly in flashbacks, and you get a bit more of Michael's story through each chapter.
This is the story of a young boy who is rendered mute after a horrific instance in his life when he was quite young. We don't find out the actual event until very late in the book.
Michael is a talented artist as well as someone who is very adept at picking locks. This lock-picking talent gets him involved with a seedy crowd. Along the way, he meets Amelia, who is also an artist. Through pictures they tell their story to each other.
It is told mainly in flashbacks, and you get a bit more of Michael's story through each chapter.
in_and_out_of_the_stash's review against another edition
4.0
The guy's in prison. The tale is told through flashbacks, you eventually find out what has happened to him. How will it end? Not a disappointment.
ayaktruk's review against another edition
3.0
My first Steve Hamilton novel. Enjoyed it more than I thought. Could almost fit into Y/A category with some sanitizing.
Scenario was interesting and world of the "boxman" was unique and untapped -- at least for me, felt authentic.
Will keep SA on my list for lookout novels and may now consider going back to read his celebrated Alex McKnight series.
Scenario was interesting and world of the "boxman" was unique and untapped -- at least for me, felt authentic.
Will keep SA on my list for lookout novels and may now consider going back to read his celebrated Alex McKnight series.
littletaiko's review against another edition
4.0
The Lock Artist was the last book I read of the Anthony Awards nominees. The story of a young "boxman" who can open any safe or lock was an intriguing premise. Add to that the fact that he never speaks and you get an unusual story. It was a very enjoyable story that really made me want to learn how to pick a lock or crack open a safe. Fortunately, I doubt I'll turn to a life of crime since I don't really have the patience!
annevoi's review against another edition
3.0
The Lock Artist is a thriller of sorts, narrated by a mute "boxman," or safe-breaker, named Michael. His muteness is not physical, but psychological: when he was eight, he suffered a trauma—that is told about in detail only about fifty pages from the end—and he has not spoken since. Michael tells us at the outset that he is in prison, twenty years later. The bulk of the book outlines a year in his life when he was seventeen and eighteen—so, ten years earlier. Just a normal high school kid, with an aptitude for drawing. And also for picking locks and divining safe combinations. The sort of talent that can get you into trouble.
He tells the story by weaving back and forth in time, which is occasionally confusing when it comes to small details, but they're so small that you end up not caring, plus you know that Michael will eventually fill the details in. He's good about that. I enjoyed the narrative device.
The writing is consistently top notch, especially the dialogue. Where the book lacked, perhaps, was in scene setting—it mostly takes place in 1999/2000, but it could have taken place anytime for all it does not go into social/cultural/technological specifics (except the use of pagers). And although I had sympathy for Michael, he is a distant character, no doubt because of that muteness: we hear what's going on in his head as a novel way of relating conversations, for example, so we know what and how he thinks, but he's oddly unemotional. That goes with his character, of course. But it doesn't create a feeling of intimacy, and I missed that. Then too, most of the characters are crooks, who don't exactly invite others into their hearts.
If you want to know exactly how a safe-cracker cracks a safe, this books tells you. But it's decidedly not a technique only; it is very much an art, a way of listening and feeling. Michael does a good job of explaining that.
Here he describes his uncle Lito, who runs a liquor store and took him in after the tragedy:
I could tell Uncle Lito was trying hard to figure out what to do with me. "We're just a couple of bachelors," he said to me on more than one occasion. "Living off the fat of the land, eh? What do you say we go to the Flame and get a bite to eat." As if the Flame's food qualified as the fat of the land. We'd sit in the booth and Uncle Lito would run down his day to me in great detail, how many bottles of this or that he sold and what he needed to reorder. I'd sit there completely silent. Of course. Whether I was really listening to him, it didn't seem to matter much. He just kept up his end of a one-sided conversation, pretty much every waking moment. . . .
This habit of his, this jabbering on and on all the time . . . it's the kind of thing I'd run into a lot, wherever I went. People who naturally like to talk, it takes them a minute to get used to me, but once they do they just turn it on and never turn it off. God forbid there be one moment of silence.
The quiet people, on the other hand . . . I usually make them uncomfortable as hell, because they know they can't compete with me. I'll out-quiet anybody, in any venue for any stakes. I'm the undisputed champion of keeping my mouth shut and just sitting there like a piece of furniture.
All in all, I enjoyed this book. Great literature, no; but a satisfying tale, very much so.
He tells the story by weaving back and forth in time, which is occasionally confusing when it comes to small details, but they're so small that you end up not caring, plus you know that Michael will eventually fill the details in. He's good about that. I enjoyed the narrative device.
The writing is consistently top notch, especially the dialogue. Where the book lacked, perhaps, was in scene setting—it mostly takes place in 1999/2000, but it could have taken place anytime for all it does not go into social/cultural/technological specifics (except the use of pagers). And although I had sympathy for Michael, he is a distant character, no doubt because of that muteness: we hear what's going on in his head as a novel way of relating conversations, for example, so we know what and how he thinks, but he's oddly unemotional. That goes with his character, of course. But it doesn't create a feeling of intimacy, and I missed that. Then too, most of the characters are crooks, who don't exactly invite others into their hearts.
If you want to know exactly how a safe-cracker cracks a safe, this books tells you. But it's decidedly not a technique only; it is very much an art, a way of listening and feeling. Michael does a good job of explaining that.
Here he describes his uncle Lito, who runs a liquor store and took him in after the tragedy:
I could tell Uncle Lito was trying hard to figure out what to do with me. "We're just a couple of bachelors," he said to me on more than one occasion. "Living off the fat of the land, eh? What do you say we go to the Flame and get a bite to eat." As if the Flame's food qualified as the fat of the land. We'd sit in the booth and Uncle Lito would run down his day to me in great detail, how many bottles of this or that he sold and what he needed to reorder. I'd sit there completely silent. Of course. Whether I was really listening to him, it didn't seem to matter much. He just kept up his end of a one-sided conversation, pretty much every waking moment. . . .
This habit of his, this jabbering on and on all the time . . . it's the kind of thing I'd run into a lot, wherever I went. People who naturally like to talk, it takes them a minute to get used to me, but once they do they just turn it on and never turn it off. God forbid there be one moment of silence.
The quiet people, on the other hand . . . I usually make them uncomfortable as hell, because they know they can't compete with me. I'll out-quiet anybody, in any venue for any stakes. I'm the undisputed champion of keeping my mouth shut and just sitting there like a piece of furniture.
All in all, I enjoyed this book. Great literature, no; but a satisfying tale, very much so.