Floodgate, Johnny Shaw
Floodgate, Johnny Shaw
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Floodgate

Author: Johnny Shaw

Narrator: Patrick Lawlor

Unabridged: 8 hr 34 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download (DRM Protected)

Published: 02/16/2016


Synopsis

Andy Destra is a mostly honest cop in the most notoriously corrupt and crime-ridden city in America: Auction City. After discovering explosive information that reveals corruption within the highest levels of the police department, Andy is kicked off the force, framed, and disgraced, left to wage a lonely one-man crusade against conspiracies he can’t prove.Andy’s investigation plunges him into a blackly comic maelstrom of one-armed gang members, slick pickpockets, criminal syndicates, hired mercenaries, escaped convicts, sewer dwellers, and one sinister ice cream truck. At the same time, he must contend with a mystery closer to home: the true identity of his parents, his most unshakeable obsession. Understanding their past may be the key to Auction City’s future as it teeters on the brink of chaos.If Andy can’t solve this case, the Floodgate will fail…and his city will burn.

About Johnny Shaw

Johnny Shaw was born and raised in the Imperial Valley on the Calexico/Mexicali border. He received his Master of Fine Arts in screenwriting from UCLA. In addition to his work as a screenwriter and playwright, he owns a used bookstore and teaches writing. He lives in Portland, Oregon. Dove Season is his first novel.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Razvan on March 28, 2025

At least two or three of Mac Lean's books are little masterpieces, but that's not the case about Floodgate. The book is too long and filled with unnecessary talk, the characters are not the most pleasant ones, the atmosphere is dull. And most of all, the action is linear and ends somehow derisory.......more

Goodreads review by Imran on July 09, 2017

As a MacLean fan I have a large number of his novels in my kindle. When I want to 'lighten' my reading material I often turn to MacLean. I fear I am now through most of his better novels and am scraping by on much of his mediocre work. Floodgate is one of his 'not great' novels. The idea behind the......more

Goodreads review by Wilma on March 23, 2018

I have read a few Alistair MacLean books in the past but I had a hard time with this one. The dialogue seemed so forced and unnatural, no real twists in the plot and I find it hard to believe that he and the other undercover detective were such masters at disguises. For me this book was not in the c......more

Goodreads review by Britt on April 10, 2025

Reread I've lost track of how many times I've read this book. Still excellent. My first trip overseas, I flew through Ampsterdam airport. With this book. I thought it was an excellent choice then and I still do. Van Effen is brilliant. The supporting cast is also brilliant.......more

Goodreads review by VijayaRaghavan on February 21, 2016

This is the second book that I am reading of Mr MacLean after 'The puppet in a chain'. There were a lot of consistencies in those two books. The one that jumps on you is the thought that the main character is a heartless wrench who got no feelings or emotions even for the people with whom he is work......more


Quotes

“Shaw (Plaster City) deftly mixes the odd and the humorous with cinematic action.” Publishers WeeklyFloodgate is at once hilarious, relentless, wicked, gritty, sardonic, and earnest. In other words, it’s a Johnny Shaw novel, which means it’s guaranteed to make your day vanish in a headlong rush of joy.” —Marcus Sakey, author of the bestselling Brilliance trilogy“Darkly comic, marvelously inventive, and thrumming with the promise of cataclysmic violence no more than a page turn away, Floodgate is a runaway freight train. Auction City is a fantastic creation, equal to Frank Miller’s Sin City in the scope of its mythology—and in the godless depravity that lives within its borders.” —Owen Laukkanen, author of The Stolen Ones“It’s well established that Johnny Shaw’s got a knack for character and a facility with language, but in Floodgate, Shaw tackles his most sweeping, epic tale to date—without sacrificing an iota of his trademark humor. It reads like The Warriors broke out in Dashiell Hammett’s Poisonville and The Untouchables were too hungover to take the call. Bottom line: I loved this book—and I think anybody with working eyeballs and a pulse is gonna, too.” —Chris Holm, author of The Killing Kind“Johnny Shaw has crafted a uniquely devilish world with its delightfully memorable inhabitants and their odd histories, married with a page-turning plot full of surprises and twists down the scary back alleys of the mythical city of Auction, USA.” —Gregory Widen, author of Blood Makes Noise and screenwriter of HighlanderFloodgate is dark and violent, twisted and funny in the way that makes you wonder if you should be laughing. Writing with equal parts gallows humor, history, and mayhem, Johnny Shaw recasts the police procedural as an exploration of corruption that gets weirder—yet makes more sense—at every turn.” —Dana Cameron, author of the Fangborn series“Every new Johnny Shaw novel is a cause for celebration, and Floodgate may be his best yet. A tilt-a-whirl ride of crime and conspiracy that turns on a dime from madcap comedy, to high-octane thriller, to touching family drama. I absolutely loved it. Johnny Shaw is a mad genius.” —Sean Chercover, author of The Devil’s Game“I hate Johnny Shaw. He’s funny, and smart, and he makes me jealous. Floodgate is a noir novel by way of Big Trouble In Little China, and I wish I’d thought of it first. But don’t take my word for it. Go read the book, and hate him your own self.” —Jay Stringer, author of Ways to Die in Glasgow