A Better Goodbye, John Schulian
A Better Goodbye, John Schulian
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A Better Goodbye
A Novel

Author: John Schulian

Narrator: Keith Szarabajka

Unabridged: 7 hr 55 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 12/04/2015

Synopsis

A retired masseuse and a retired boxer take jobs working for an actor, and love and jealousy soon follow.Nick Pafko knows he can’t be a professional boxer forever. But he never guessed it would end so quickly—and so wrong. Broke and unemployed, Nick has little choice but to call a number given to him by a friend. On the other end is Scott, a washed-up B-movie actor who runs a so-called massage parlor looking for somebody desperate enough to work security.Jenny Yee doesn’t really mind massage, until the day she finds her coworkers robbed and assaulted. Fearing for her safety, she resolves to never work without security again. With mounting expenses, she knows massage is the fastest way to get paid. When an old massage acquaintance calls Jenny to ask her to work for Scott, she agrees—and before long, she’s the top earner.Scott is an arrogant moron, but he’s harmless compared to the thug he calls “friend”—Onus DuPree. When DuPree decides to rob Scott’s massage joint, it’s the perfect opportunity to beat up Nick and take advantage of Jenny. Can Nick stay true to his promise to protect Jenny? Can he protect himself?

About John Schulian

John Schulian is a former Chicago Sun-Times sports columnist, a longtime contributor to GQ and Sports Illustrated, and a cocreator of TV’s Xena: Warrior Princess. His short fiction has appeared in the Prague Revue and on the website ThugLit. A Better Goodbye is his first novel.

About Keith Szarabajka

Keith Szarabajka has appeared in many films, including The Dark Knight, Missing, and A Perfect World, and on such television shows as The Equalizer, Angel, Cold Case, Golden Years, and Profit. Szarabajka has also appeared in several episodes of Selected Shorts for National Public Radio. He won the 2001 Audie Award for Unabridged Fiction for his reading of Tom Robbins’s Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates and has won several Earphones Awards.

Reviews

Goodreads review by James

This is a dark, gritty novel set in contemporary Los Angeles and featuring two principal characters, Nick Pafko and Jenny Yee. Nick is a former boxer who had a promising career until he accidentally killed an opponent in the ring. After that he was never able to deliver another punishing blow and hi......more

Goodreads review by Don

(1 1/2). This book falls into an interesting genre, California noir. It is opaquely dark, not heavy, not light, but always there. We have four very interesting characters here, but there is way too much time spent focusing on them rather than developing the story. The plot just moves too slowly. The......more

Goodreads review by Jim

A BETTER GOODBYE is an uneven but never uninteresting debut crime novel. Jenny is a little too smart and decent for the cynical, manipulative world of shady massage operations in which she makes her halfway way through life. Nick is a washed-up boxer who needs work — and beyond that, needs purpose. O......more

Goodreads review by Victoria

If you’ve wondered what goes on in those sketchy “massage” parlors, this expertly written and well paced debut thriller is your chance to find out. Set in Los Angeles on the bitter fringes of the entertainment industry and reeking of fake glamour, the story pulls you into its world from the opening......more

Quotes

“This visceral, gritty noir takes place on the seedy fringes of modern Hollywood…The dialogue is razor sharp, and the characters well developed—the good-hearted Nick is easy to root for. A robbery triggers a grisly showdown as this thriller hurtles toward its nail-biting conclusion.” Publishers Weekly

“Schulian is a former Chicago sports journalist who relocated to LA…and his first novel tells the tales of a boxer haunted by the man he killed in the ring…As a low-key look at LA lowlife, this has its strong passages.” Booklist

“A Better Goodbye is a peek at the grit beneath the glitter of the Southern California myth…Nobody walks away unscathed. And neither will you.” Richard Lange, author of Angel Baby

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