Six Hours Past Thursday by Jack Payne

Six Hours Past Thursday by Jack Payne

This is the story of Steve Draves a shady businessman who constantly skirts the law lying, misrepresenting, and finagling people out of their money in crooked real estate and business brokerage deals.

Draves is used to show the many different ways that a businessman can fleece their customers. He does everything from selling worthless property at high prices, double and triple billing, sending bills for unordered items to using middlemen to sell property to unwanted developers.

Jack Payne the author likes to expose the many different ways people can be ripped off legally. The main character, Steve Draves personal story starts with leaded marbles, card sharping, then selling numbers in college, to crooked salesmanship, and finally to crooked real estate brokerage. Steve Draves seems to worship getting ahead in the world.

Draves has many bad habits which ultimately bring his downfall. Although he is married to a beautiful woman, has a nice house, and two children he can never be satisfied.

He constantly chases women who he sees little more than sex objects. There is an irony in him describing women in the terms of sex objects. He never succeeds in getting any of them in bed because he treats them badly. Ironically, when a woman flings herself at him, he runs away trying to protect his marriage.

Steve Draves is one of the six martini after work crowd at a dive bar. He never stops looking for a deal.

Drave ultimately breaks his own rules and ends up on the wrong side of the mob after he tries to sell an island off the coast of Florida to a mobster. The mob boss considers him completely untrustworthy and crooked.

Even though Drave's finally succeeds financially he comes to a bad end. This is a morality tale about corruption of the soul and pocketbook. At times, Steve Draves, the main character, expresses some very sexist corrupt ideas. This may bother some people.

The descriptions of corruption, crooked dealing, and chicanery are the best part of the book. Little details like running an audio tape of a typing pool as background noise for Drave's office are very interesting.

The book begins in 1966 and ends in 1968. The social mores and setting are very different than the ones we have today. In a way, this book is an ode to an era that has long since passed. The three martini lunch is a thing of the past as well as many of the things expressed in this book.

I liked reading the book. It was a very solid story. It will not be for everyone. Some people may find it too sexist, or find the style of writing a little flat. If you want to learn a little bit about crooked business deals this is also a good read.

Jack Payne has a site which gives the first three chapters away for free. http://www.sixhrs.com/ . I spent a little bit of time looking at Worldcat. I think his most famous book is How To Make A Fortune In Finders Fees. He is a regular contributor to the forums on Blogcatalog. He comes across as an old fashioned, conservative with a bit of a maverick streak.

Daily Thoughts

Wisdom, mural by Robert Lewis Reid. Second Floor, North Corridor. Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building, Washington, D.C., Caption underneath reads "KNOWLEDGE COMES BVT WISDOM LINGERS".

Daily Thoughts

Most of this morning was spent weeding the reference books as well as changing the location of some titles to the storage stacks to create room. We are relocating the periodicals desk to a new location.

Right now, our library is moving around furniture. The cybercorner got moved to a new location and is current;y under renovation. They are running new wiring through the floor. The computers are being updated. Because the cyerbcorner is closed right now, it is very quiet. Some of our stacks are going to be moved around as well.

I spent some time figuring out where to put the dictionary stand and the atlas stand and talked to the director about rearranging the furniture in the Job Information Center. I am really not quite sure how to rearrange the furniture in the Job Information Center.

I also filed some looseleafs for the New York Code of Rules and Regulations. I find filing to be relaxing sometimes. It is a very basic kind of activity.

Today was the African American Read In Chain in the community room from 1:00-4:00 p.m.. People read poetry, read from plays, and gave speeches in honor of African American History Month. They had a nice spread with salad, lasagna, cookies, and water. I had my lunch while listening to someone recite poetry.

I finished reading Jack Payne's Six Hours Past Thursday. The best part of the story in this book was the unrelenting antiheroism of the main character which eventually does him in.

Daily Thoughts

Jack Kerouac's poem in the center of San Francisco Chinatown's Jack Kerouac Alley.

Daily Thoughts

I am reading Marianne Mancusi, Razor Girl Love Cuts Both Ways, an action romance. The book is part of the Shomi Fiction action romance series. It is very campy. During the first part of the book, they even include some words on George Romero. On the Shomi Fiction site, you can see the author Marianne Mancusi in a gothic lolita cosplay outfit. This is kind of entertaining. http://www.shomifiction.com/ . It makes the book both contemporary and a bit geeky.

The book is published by Dorchester Publishers. They also do the Hard Case Crime line of noire mystery paperbacks which I really like also. http://www.hardcasecrime.com/ . I have read a bunch of Dorchester paperbacks including Max Allan Collins, Ms. Tree. I like the publishers campy irreverent style. It is making them well known very quickly. http://www.dorchesterpub.com/ .

I watched Walt Disney's The Sword In The Stone, 45th Anniversary Edition this afternoon. This is based on T.H. White's Sword In The Stone written in 1938. It is the first part of The Once and Future King, a classic of fantasy. People still ask for the book occassionally. The movie brought back memories from when I was a child. I remember seeing it when I was seven years old in the theater. Sometimes, it comes on television. The screenplay is written by Bill Peet who is one of my favorite childrens book writers.

I really like the way that Arthur or wart as he is called in the film is transformed first into a fish, then a squirrel, then a bird. The animation is wonderful. It has a whimsical quality to it. These are my favorite parts of the movie. It is a nice reminder that using your brain is the best way to get ahead in the world.

Ekaterina Sedia who wrote The Secret History of Moscow has a new novel, The Alchemy of Stone. It is supposed to be a steampunk novel. I am looking forward to reading it.

Jonathan Carroll also has a new novel, The Ghost In Love, it is supposed to be a paranormal fiction novel, but as all of his novels, it probably has some very unusual philosophy woven into it as well.

I searched http://www.worldcat.org which lists the holdings of a lot of the public and academic libraries in the United States and found 196 listings for Jack Payne's Six Hours Past Thursday. I am going to place an interlibrary loan for the book this Saturday when I go back to work.