Joe Gores: Interface (UK 2004)

From the Publisher:
Neil Fargo is a San Francisco private investigator hired by the wealthy Maxwell Stayton to find his missing daughter. His search takes him into the very heart of the city's ugly underbelly. And Fargo makes the move into the drug business at just about the same time as Docker, a Vietnam veteran with close links to Fargo, is storming through San Francisco's criminal underworld on a murderous campaign of revenge.

Joe Gores: Interface. Orion Books, ISBN: 0752851888 (September, 2004), Crime Masterworks 39, 213 p., £6.99.

Joe Gores: Interface (UK 1977)

From the Publisher:
A RAT'S NEST OF JUNK, ALCOHOL AND VICE
Private investigator Neil Fargo is hired by plutocrat Maxwell Stayton to find his missing daughter, Roberta. And the San Francisco he uncovers is no picture postcard.

Neither is Roberta - peddling her body around a sleazy hotel to pay her junk bill.
Fargo moves into the drug business, and so does Docker, a Vietnam veteran who storms through San Francisco like an avenging angel.

A rough, tough, brutal thriller for the seventies - crackling dialogue and a cracking pace.

'Not since Hammett and Chandler has anyone written quite as well as Joe Gores. He will probably be regarded as one of the masters in years to come.' -- Ross Thomas

Joe Gores: Interface. London: Futura Publications, 1977, ISBN: 0860075737, 216 p., 80p.

Joe Gores: Interface (USA 1976)

From the Publisher:
INTERFACE -- the DMZ where law and order meets the criminal underworld!
INTERFACE -- the double life of Neil Fargo, a private investigator and a dealer in heroin... with partners.
INTERFACE -- the story of Docker, ex-Vietnam G.I., ruthless killer and bagman who ripped apart Fargo's boundary lines to impose a world of his own... in a brutal, suicidal scheme of revenge!

INTERFACE -- a gripping, dramatic manhunt... with everyone running for his life!

"VERY HARD, VERY FAST AND OBVIOUSLY DESIGNED TO KEEP YOU ON PINS AND NEEDLES. IT DOES!" -- KIRKUS REVIEWS
"IN BRIEF, A HELL OF A BOOK." -- STANLEY ELLIN

Joe Gores: Interface. A nerve-shattering manhunt... for a crazed killer who double-crossed the mob! Ballantine Books, ISBN: 0345244052 (March, 1976), 216 p., $1.50.

Joe Gores: Interface (USA 1974)

From the Publisher:
Neil Fargo was a hard-nosed private investigator with a business on the side: heroin. The investigating he did on his own; the drug line he shared with a man called Walter Harriss. Fargo was strong enough, cool enough, to live in two worlds, and tough enough to keep control of both. Until he hired Docker.

Docker, Fargo explained to Harriss, was an old army buddy. He would make a damn good bag man. He could be trusted. So when a drug shipment arrived, Fargo set up a meeting; the drug courier, a chemist to test the drugs for purity, and Docker. All Docker had to do was hand over a briefcase full of money and collect the shipment. But Docker did more than that: the courier was found dead, the chemist beaten -- the drugs and the money were gone. And Fargo had to answer to Harriss for Docker's disappearance.

INTERFACE is the story of a chase: Harriss and Fargo both know that if they don't stop Docker from getting out of San Francisco, they'll never see the drugs or the money again. They'll do anything to stop him -- and Docker will do anything to keep the story of Fargo, a man walking the tightrope between two lives, determined to survive in both.

JOE GORES was a private investigator in San Francisco for a dozen years. He has published more than 100 short stories and four novels, including the widely praised Dead Skip and Final Notice.

Jacket by Don Bender

Joe Gores: Interface. A Novel. M. Evans and Co., ISBN: 0871311461 (March, 1974), 216 p., $5.95.