RUMBLE ON THE DOCKS

by Frank Paley ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 9, 1953

From the newspapers, this works into fictional shape the recent waterfront scandal and shake-up and belts out a rough transcript of the chain action of syndicated crime which extends from its bosses down to the punks who work for them. Jimmy Smigelski's father is fighting the dock bosses, who crippled him, from a wheelchair, along with Father Kivlen and Marchesl. But Jimmy, who is a member of the Diggers, a teen age gang, has no sympathy for his father but rather with Brindo, a flashy but powerful politico. The murder of Marchesl blows the situation wide open; Jimmy is thrown out by his father, and taken on by Brindo to be used as a witness in the trial to come. He leaves the vagrant, delinquent world of the Diggers and their stomping and rumbling far behind; he is housed in a ""hotbed"" until the trial; but after his testimony, when he runs away to his hide-out in a stable, Brindo comes after him- and he kills him. The Diggers raise the money for him to jump a ship and escape the dragnet- but the arrest of two of his friends brings him back-to turn himself in.... A shabby, shoddy story which has its documentation of fact in the area from which it derives- Brooklyn's Hook- and which needs no amplification to make its point.

Pub Date: Nov. 9, 1953

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Crown

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1953

Categories: FICTION