Part of the Game - Tim Reardon - Bog

When small-time bookie Chuck Holiday tries to collect from one last deadbeat gambler before he closes his business forever, his retirement plans are chewed up by a couple of disobedient pit bulls. Instead of going straight and taking advantage of an offer to play professional basketball overseas, Chuck ends up indirectly involved in the bloody death of an Irish crime boss's nephew. In this inventive crime thriller, Chuck and his palm-reader girlfriend navigate San Francisco's seedy underbelly and pull their own scam on the mob boss and a couple of ruthless Chinatown gangsters, who also have an interest in the dead Irishman.