Pat Lambe Crime Fiction Author

 The Home Page of Pat Lambe, triple threat- author, artist, telecommunications technician.

 

Updated: 10-30-05

mailto:patlambe@patlambe.com


 

 

 Characters

My two Novels ‘Strike Duty’ and ‘Carlisle’s Marker’ and 90% of my short stories feature a recurring cast of characters. A character who is a minor one in one story is often the protagonist in another. Most of the stories take place in New Jersey in general, New Brunswick in particular.

 

I used to play Dungeons and Dragons growing up (oh how I long for the sweet sound of a twenty sided die hitting a cheaply veneered table), and in order to keep your characters and their abilities straight you had to have a character sheet with all of their attributes in front of you. I have used this idea to come up with a brief character bio of some of the recurring characters featured in my fiction. It is by no means complete and I hope to add to it.

Newest Characters: Peter Dremmeck (Other Agents) Roland Hamilton (Independents) Added 05-22-04

The Mazzucco Crime Family:

‘Alleged’ Al Mazzucco

How he got his nickname: His name is always preceded by ‘alleged’ when he makes the papers

Age: Sixties

Ethnicity: Come on

Job: ‘Alleged’ head of the Mazzucco organized crime family.

Likes: Opera

Dislikes: Business irregularities

Special skills: Invariably gets way more than the customary one phone call whenever he’s pulled in by the police. He’s been know to get more than one phone, let alone a call.

Drink: Wine

 

Tullio ‘Trifecta’ Mazzucco

How he got his nickname: In his own words: “I fixed this race at Monmouth Park, a nag named Licorice Box. What the hell kind of name is that for a horse? Sounds more like a whore’s street name to me. Just for kicks, I bet a trifecta on the two races sandwiching the one I knew about. All three of them came through.”

Age: Mid thirties

Ethnicity: He’s his father’s son

Job: Owner of the Pole Truth strip club in Bound Brook NJ

Likes: Courvoissier, his BMW 745, sleeping with strippers

Dislikes: Reilly, Herczog,

Special skills: He does this thing with his tongue…

Drink: Courvoissier

 

Sal ‘the Grazer’ Grazioli

How he got his nick name: Plants bodies in a field where the cows graze

Age: early forties

Ethnicity: Who’s asking?

Job: Union Official

Likes: Bikes, Horses

Dislikes: His wife Ninfa Mazzucco, Donovan

Special skills: Racketeering

Drink: Fancy micro brewed beer

 

Tony ‘GQ’ Carlisle

How he got his nickname: Just check out the threads

Age: 23

Ethnicity: He’s thinking of changing his last name to Carlucci, for business purposes.

Job: Expidator

Likes: Reilly, his Kyrocera cell phone/organizer, health food, giving people advice, The Discovery Channel, pork roll with saltpeppercatchup (just once a week though), surf fishing, New Jersey

Dislikes: Herczog

Special skills: He’s a natural investigator

Drink: Courvoissier

 

Gino ‘The Ventilator’ Verenichi

How he got his nickname: Got stuck in a vent during a robbery attempt

Age: 27

Ethnicity: Italian American

Job: Expidator

Likes: Tony Carlisle, Omar Aboud, La’ Cross, a custom tailored suit, kickin’ it back old school

Dislikes: Political correctness, Russian Gangsters

Special skills: He can actually listen to Tony dispense advice for hours without getting annoyed

Drink: Courvoissier

 

New Jersey State Troopers:

Vernon Herczog

Age: Early forties

Ethnicity: Hungarian

Job: New Jersey State Trooper, Organized Crime Division

Likes: There’s got to be something…

Dislikes: His ex-wife, Reilly, Gino, paying for his drinks

Special skills: Speaks fluent Hungarian

Drink: Bourbon

 

Milton Fisk

Age: Early forties

Ethnicity: African American

Job: New Jersey State Trooper, Organized Crime Division

Likes: When the voices in his head stop for a brief second…

Dislikes: Anything named Mazzucco, Reilly

Special skills: He’s managed to stay out of a mental hospital until his early forties

Drink: He should be on a lithium cocktail

 

New Brunswick’s Finest

Andrew McCarthy

Age: Mid fifties

Ethnicity: Irish American

Job: Lieutenant, New Brunswick Police Department

Likes: Reilly, his family

Dislikes: Phil Groendyke, paperwork

Special skills: He’s really good at fixing crime scenes to suit his purposes

Drink: Yes please, and keep them coming

 

Darnell Levy

Age: 29

Ethnicity: African American

Job: Detective, New Brunswick Police Department

Likes: McCarthy, Reilly, His partner Lueken, the ladies

Dislikes: Tolland, Tony Carlisle, and his ‘associates’

Special skills: Public speaking, he’s real good at press conferences

Drink: Johnney Walker black on the rocks, blue if some else is paying

 

Fred Lueken

Age: Mid to late thirties

Ethnicity: English, Hungarian, Scottish

Job: Detective, New Brunswick Police Department

Likes: Darnell, horse racing,

Dislikes: Reilly, horses (he actually has a love hate relationship with our equine cousins. He is forced to shoot one in my short story ‘Shooting Incident’)

Special skills: He’s got this system he’s working on, just a little more time and…

Drink: Occasional martini

 

Keith Tolland

Age: Late thirties

Ethnicity: Irish American, many others

Job: Detective New Brunswick Police Department (although he has other ways of supplementing his income)

Likes: Getting away with things

Dislikes: The New Brunswick Parking authority

Special skills: Manages to stay on the force

Drink: Scotch on the rocks

 

Other Agencies

 

Agent Varrick

Age: 40

Ethnicity: Eastern European, Irish, and Polish

Job: Investigator New Jersey Racing Commission

Likes: His job

Dislikes: Everyone telling him he looks like a young Kojak

Special skills: Knows how to test horses for drugs

Drink: Beer

 

Agent Nolan

Age: late thirties - early forties

Ethnicity: African American

Job: FBI agent

Likes: his job, his wife, mint tea

Dislikes: Herczog, people who don’t think he’s a real FBI agent because his badge doesn’t look the one on the X-Files

Special skills: He actually gets along with the local cops, for the most part

Drink: Occasional beer

Peter Dremmeck

Abe: 32

Job: Animal Detection Officer (formerly K-9 Unit) Middlesex County Sherrifs Office

Ethnicity: Mixed

Likes: His legendary police dog Wonderdog (now retired) Wonderdog's replacements (reluctently) Rigalito and Lemmiwinks

Dislikes: The fact that, due to budget cuts, Wonderdog has been replaced by a pair of Gambian giant pack rats.

Special skills: Animal Husbantry

Drinks: Occasional beer

 

Independents

 

Caellachan Reilly

Age: 36

Ethnicity: Irish, German

Job: Telephone technician, part time private investigator, part time bartender

Likes: Lisa, investigating, Tony Carlisle, his cat, playing Stratego, unexplained phenomenon (bigfoot, ufo’s, women) the ladies

Dislikes: Vernon Herczog, Donovan, his first name, sobriety, the ladies

Special skills: Despite being 6’4 and 220 lbs he has never won a fight

Drink: Bud bottle, shot of Jameson, Jaegermeister

 

Miles Patrick Donovan

Age: 30

Ethnicity: Irish, German, Dutch

Job: Telephone technician, landscaper, mechanic, petty criminal

Likes: His bike, Horses, nature, surf fishing

Dislikes: Reilly, Herczog, NJ mandatory helmet laws

Special skills: Despite a limited IQ he knows a lot about animals and the environment. He has a black belt in Irish judo (which basically means he has a mean head butt)

Drink: Bud in a can, whiskey, but none of that imported crap

 

Richard Dukevsky

Age: 30

Ethnicity: Polish American

Job: Part time professional wrestler, part time landscaper, petty criminal

Likes: Coke, Amphetamines,

Dislikes: His boss at the wrestling federation, Calhoun Lounighan, bikers (except his best friend Donovan at times) people sticking guns in his mouth

Special skills: Getting paid to run around in his underwear beating the shit out of people

Drink: Beer

 

Lisa McCarthy

Age: 34

Ethnicity: Irish American

Job: Middlesex County NJ assistant prosecutor

Likes: Reilly (at times) her job, art, her new boyfriend Tom

Dislikes: Reilly (most of the time) Groendyke,

Special skills: Warding off Reilly’s inept sexual advances, painting, knows more about guns than anyone else

Drink: Guinness

 

Omar Aboud

Age: 27

Ethnicity: Lebanese American

Job: Sometimes associate of the Mazzucco family, sometimes associate of the Farouk Brothers, Army reservist (Military Police)

Likes: His wife Molly, family, La’Crosse, Gino, the ladies

Dislikes: Monogamy, having to go to Baghdad when he’s called up for active duty

Special skills: speaks passable Arabic, good with lock picks

Drink: Scotch

 

Mark Leyner

Age: 33

Ethnicity: Finish American

Job: Bartender Court Tavern, New Brunswick NJ

Likes: Drinking, film, Reilly,

Dislikes: AA Members, people pointing guns at him, cops, mobsters,

Special skills: You pick some things up working in a bar

Drink: Heineken, Jameson shots

 

Tina

Age: 35

Ethnicity: Italian American

Job: Secretary for Carlisle and Verenich Expidators

Likes: Tullio ‘Trifecta’ Mazzucco, Reilly, the eighties

Dislikes: The ticking of her biological clock, Tullio (at times), silence

Special skills: You should see her in a black dress

Drink: Gin martini, Long Island Iced tea

 

Phil Groendyke

Age: Around thirty

Job: Construction worker, criminal

Ethnicity: Dutch American

Likes: S and M, guns, playing bass in a rock and roll band

Dislikes: Officer McCarthy, Reilly

Special skills: Escaping and avoiding capture

Drink: Bud Bottle, shot of whatever will do the job

 

Irene

Age: Mid to late twenties

Job: Exotic dancer, the Pole Truth

Ethnicity: Polish, Irish, Jewish

Likes: Money, the nightlife, woman

Dislikes: Men, her job

Special skills: Insert immature joke here

Drink: Champagne, Jaegermeister

 

‘Sweet Captain Diamond’ Lou White

How he got his nickname (‘s) : His life is too large to be contained by one

Age: Mid sixties

Job: Lawyer, self employed

Ethnicity: English, Welsh

Likes: His cherished memories of his time in the navy. His navy ship, ‘The Goddamned State’ which has become a floating museum on the Delaware in Camden

Dislikes: The fact that the museum is in Camden rather than the Bayonne Naval Yards where it belongs.

Special skills: Won the Korean war single handedly

Drink: Vodka Gimlet

 

Curtis Benczik

Age: Early to mid twenties

Job: Tow truck driver, part time college student

Ethnicity: Hungarian American

Likes: Extra money he gets bilking people at his job

Dislikes: being a witness to a mob killing

Special skills: He’s real good at jimmying cars, knows how to hot wire them too

Drinks: Vodka

 

Roland Hamilton

Abe: 42

Job: Reporter Home News, New Brunswick

Ethnicity: English, Hungarien

Likes: Busting Balls,

Dislikes: His city editor at the paper

Special skills: Has contacts on both sides of the law

Drinks: Hamiltonian Martini: a little more vermouth than generally accepted, beefeaters gin, a splash of orange juice, and two orange slices skewered by a cocktail sword. 

Tabback

Age: 46

Job: Long haul truck driver, owner/operator Tabback Transportation, drug smuggler

Ethnicity: Mixed

Likes: Truck stop prostitutes, thinking up ways to hide drugs, reading crime stories (Hammett, Chandler, Goodis)

Dislikes: Often himself, television,

Special skills: Thinking up new ways to smuggle stuff

Drinks: An occasional beer, shot of Wild Turkey