Sort-Of Liked: "Deadly Departures" by Ted Allbeury

Sort-Of Liked: Deadly Departures by Ted Allbeury, 2008, 9780727865762.

The cover blurb from Booklist said: Hair-raising suspense, brutal violence, steamy sex, and high-octane action. Bullshit. It was okay, the story moved along pretty well. I just noticed that this was originally published in 1976 in the U.K. That explains my confusion over the indeterminate year for the setting. I was able to figure it was the the early '70s after searching for info on a radio transmitter listed in the book. The lack of any maps of Italy was a pain in the ass.

WWII veteran, Max Farne, lives part of each year on the Italian Riviera as a yacht dealer. Englishman Max had been dropped behind the lines in the Italian mountains during WWII to work with and train partisans. He became close friends with a partisan who became a big-time gangster after the war. In a previous novel Max had helped out Big-Time Gangster but Big-Time Gangster was murdered.

Max comes into Santa Margherita and is pressured by one of Big-Time Gangster's criminal heirs into selling him Max's boat for a secret deal of some sort. Max also gets hooked up with the hot, 18-year-old blonde daughter of Big-Time Gangster. Max had never met Blond Daughter before. Blond Daughter has huge boobs that Max frequently mentions.

Max finds out Blond Daughter's life is in danger unless criminal heir finds Big-Time Gangster's missing fortune. The threat is from a second criminal heir competing with first criminal heir. Things happen: Max boinks both the Blond Daughter and Blond Daughter's English mother, searches for the missing loot, sells a couple boats, goes on the run from the gangsters with Blond Daughter, gets help from old partisan colleagues, kills some people, tries to escape by sea, is caught by Italian navy (since cops are co-opted by the gangsters and issued a warrant for Max), gets away by threatening reveal of the loot (multiple pounds of heroin destined for the U.K. and New York) which would embarrass government.