Every Thompson book is my favorite while I'm reading it but this one managed to stay near the top when I was done. A trio of hard boiled characters each desperate in their own way hoping for the quick score that will "fix" everything. Except they are incapable of playing nice together. The unfolding of who is playing who for a sucker and how is true Thompson. While devious and unfeeling, you understand completely how each character comes to the conclusions that they do. The delicious trick lies in having good deeds and evil deeds moving along the same street toward the same fate. The dame, the pug and the crooked ex-cop spiral together into the dark.