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This week’s Time Out New York has a great — out of six, but still, a four-star review — by Anderson Tepper of Rubem Fonseca’s The Taker and Other Stories.

In short, fragmented vignettes that ring with the hard-boiled edge of crime fiction. Fonseca, 83, has charted his own territory, a Third World nightmare of random violence and anomie, festering rage and class resentment. In stories like ���Ĵ�ý�The Taker���Ĵ�ý� and ���Ĵ�ý�Happy New Year,���Ĵ�ý� assassins pick out their prey among wealthy partygoers before casually and remorselessly cutting them down to size. (Literally, too���Ĵ�ý�this book is rife with scenes of mutilation, in which body parts often end up stuffed into boxes and briefcases.)