Vengeance Is Mine, All Others Pay Cash

Under a violent regime, two boys peeping through a hole in a window watch two policemen rape a madwoman, and from that night the "bird" of one of them, Ajo Kawir, falls into a long sleep that nobody can end. He takes out his frustration in fights and becomes a feared brawler in the Javanese underworld. Hired to finish off a hoodlum called the Tiger, he meets Iteung instead, a fierce, beautiful bodyguard who leaves him bruised and in love, though he fears he can never make her happy. Written in brief, filmic scenes and in the idiom of pulp novels and action films, the book is about violence, how far vengeance can go and what love can mend.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Length

242 pages in the original

Genres

Crime, Love (assigned by AI)

Set in

Indonesia

First published

2014 by Gramedia Pustaka Utama

ISBN

9786020303932 (original)

9780811225649 (New Directions, United States)

9781782274285 (Pushkin Press, United Kingdom)