In het boek worden bepaalde personages wel prachtig neergezet.. Bijvoorbeeld over Vince Masuka:
quote:
Sitting on an overturned plastic milk carton on the far end of the Dumpster, poking through a handful of
waste matter, was Vince Masuoka. He was half Japanese and liked to joke that he got the short half. He
called it a joke, anyway.
There was something just slightly off in Vince's bright, Asian smile. Like he had learned to smile from a
picture book. Even when he made the required dirty put-down jokes with the cops, nobody got mad at
him. Nobody laughed, either, but that didn't stop him. He kept making all the correct ritual gestures, but
he always seemed to be faking. That's why I liked him, I think. Another guy pretending to be human, just
like me.
“Well, Dexter,” Vince said without looking up. “What brings you here?”
“I came to see how real experts operate in a totally professional atmosphere,” I said. “Have you seen
any?”
“Ha-ha,” he said. It was supposed to be a laugh, but it was even phonier than his smile. “You must think
you're inBoston .” He found something and held it up to the light, squinting. “Seriously, why are you
here?”
“Why wouldn't I be here, Vince?” I said, pretending to sound indignant. “It's a crime scene, isn't it?”
“You do blood spatter,” he said, throwing away whatever he'd been staring at and searching for another
one.
“I knew that.”
He looked at me with his biggest fake smile. “There's no blood here, Dex.”
I felt light-headed. “What does that mean?”
“There's no blood in or on or near, Dex. No blood at all. Weirdest thing you ever saw,” he said.
No blood at all. I could hear that phrase repeat itself in my head, louder each time. No sticky, hot,
messy, awful blood. No splatter. No stain. NO BLOOD AT ALL.
Why hadn't I thought of that?
It felt like a missing piece to something I didn't know was incomplete.
The poet presents the imagination with images from life and human characters and situations, sets them all in motion and leaves it to the beholder to let these images take his thoughts as far as his mental powers will permit.