Review #1 - The Extortioners

 The Extortioners by Ovid Demaris

Ovid Demaris (1919-1998) was well known for his non-fiction work. Seventeen of the thirty-four books he published were investigative journalism focused on organized crime. But like every reporter out there, he dabbled in fiction. And he sure followed the axiom “write what you know” to the letter. 

In 1960, Demaris published The Extortioners, #960, of Fawcett Gold Medal Books. It’s a story about the ultimate American fiction, a self-made millionaire, and his run-in with the mafia. 

Hugh Dewitt is a pug-faced, red-headed former wildcatter with a seventh-grade education (if that) who struck it rich drilling for oil in the hills of Los Angeles, earning him an astronomical $10 million. He has a blond beauty model wife, Nancy, and a blond supermodel daughter, Alison, because, of course, he does. But everything takes a turn when an old friend, Angelo Rizzola, and his girlfriend, Lola, come a-calling, asking for a stake in Dewitt’s oil claim. Though no promises were made, nothing written down, except for a non-committal grunt from Dewitt, Angelo believes in his heart that he’s getting that stake and the gob-smacking $10,000 a year that it earns. There’s just a slight problem: he doesn’t have the capital to buy in. So, just like any other hood trying to get rich quickly, he goes to his capomandamento Jimmy Gracio, promising ol’ Jimmy a part of the stake if he fronts the cash. And… he accepts? With nothing to prove that any part of this scheme exists, Jimmy just gives Angelo the investment money. Okay.

When Angelo tries to collect the stake, lo and behold, Dewitt doesn’t remember promising him. A he-said-he-said ensues. You know where this is going; the Gracio crime syndicate gets involved. And by that, I mean Jimmy, his seven-foot, meat-headed enforcer goon, Bastiano, and Jimmy’s A-lister movie star girlfriend, Marsha Moore (a not-too-subtle Marilyn Monroe). What follows is tit-for-tat, move-countermove, intimidation and ultimatums, violent reprisals, and the involvement of a strangely competent, To-Serve-and-Protect LAPD. 

Reading The Extortioners, I couldn’t help but feel an undercurrent of anti-Italian sentiment throughout the book. All Italian-American characters - Rizzola, Gracio, and the murderous machine Bastiano - are either sleazy to the point of incompetence, villainous to the point of parody, or violent beyond the point of sadism. Meanwhile, our other characters - Dewitt, his knockout wife and daughter, and police Sargeant Tucker - are self-reliantly, selflessly heroic, wilting victims of unconscionable violence or stoically determined to uphold the law and decency. It wasn’t my cup of tea. It was a fast read, I will say. But I don’t think I’ll seek out any other of Demaris’ novels.