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Yardie by Victor Headley
Jamaican-born, Victor Headley is a man of many facets. Indeed, he is a musician, a screenwriter, and… a novelist. He’s is also the author of three other novels: Fetish, Off Duty and Seven Seals - Seven Days.
Yardie is the first novel of a serie of three, with Excess, and the third Yush. According to some sources, there is a fourth and final part entitled The Best Man, but it seems hard to find it…
Rejected by publishing houses, Headley first published Yardie on a desktop computer in 1992, which was then hawked in his neighbourhood at London afro-Caribbean shops, clothing shops and nightclubs. This debut novel has sold 12,000 copies in England by hand distribution only, and with the growing success of its story, Yardie was finally published.
This novel is about the life of D., a yardie from Kingston who freshly landed in Brixton. He comes in this country so fantasized by illegal immigrants.
Cover : Yardie by Victor Headley
At first, it’s just a supply of cocaine… But he suddenly decided to keep the white powder for him and to establish his own business! No sooner said than done! D. the brute, who’s afraid of nothing, but who is especially very clever and cunning, rapidly finds a partner, an army of dedicated soldiers, as well as chemists. The war between the gang of D. and the Spicers (Jamaican Mafia) is then declared!
With the streets of Brixton and its sound-systems as background, the story will delight lovers of reggae music. But it's not the only thing. This novel sounds like a Tarantino's movie. You know what I mean? Those stories of bloodthirsty and ruthless mobsters, but who nonetheless seem so cool and smart, like Robbie Ordell and Jules Winnfield, mythical characters embodied by Samuel L. Jackson... So to sum it all, you take Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown, you add a bit of Scarface and a glass of good old rum (made in Jamaica of course). You shake it off, and you serve it in a London pub or in a Brixton Fish'n'Chips. You will get… Yardie!
