It’s a good rule of thumb that you shouldn’t talk to the cops if you’re suspected of a crime, and you really should NOT confess to murder if they haveIt’s a good rule of thumb that you shouldn’t talk to the cops if you’re suspected of a crime, and you really should NOT confess to murder if they haven’t found the body yet.
As a teenager Jane Mooney admitted to murdering her abusive step-father before the cops were even sure that he was dead, and she was released when no body turned up. Jane then fled the small Arkansas town of Maud Bottoms, and she left behind her angry mother, her brother, her best friend, and her girlfriend in doing so. Twenty-five years later, the stepfather’s body has finally been discovered, and Jane has returned home believing that she’ll most likely be arrested immediately. She finds that her mother is still angry, her brother and best friend seem to want nothing to do with her, and her old girlfriend, Georgia Lee, is now a married woman as well as on the town council. And for some reason, the cops don’t seem to be in any hurry to arrest her.
Kelly Ford makes their most of the setting which feels lived in and authentic. From the trailer parks to the backyard barbecue of the more well-to-do folks, this nails all the traits of small town life. Against this backdrop we learn what actually happened with Jane, Georgia Lee and the stepfather back then as well as see how those events shaped their lives in the aftermath. Jane left and lived in other places as an openly gay women but has had a shadow over her adult life. Georgia Lee stayed in place and threw herself so fully into the role of a wife, mother, and local politician that she’s never bothered to ask the question of who she really is and what would make her actually happy, and Jane’s return forces her to finally address all of this.
It’s an excellent character based crime story with solid twists and turns....more
It’s too bad that this book has been so forgotten. If only somebody would do a really good TV adaptation of it then….What’s that? Oh. Never mind.
AfterIt’s too bad that this book has been so forgotten. If only somebody would do a really good TV adaptation of it then….What’s that? Oh. Never mind.
After her mother dies Beth Harmon is sent to an orphanage, and it’s just as much fun as that sounds. However, she manages to get by thanks to daily doses of tranquilizers they give to all the girls, and she discovers a natural talent for chess thanks to a gruff janitor who reluctantly teaches her the game. Beth is eventually adopted by a less than ideal couple, but she finally manages to make her way to chess tournaments where she’s an instant sensation despite her fondness for her little green pills and a growing taste for booze. As she grows into adulthood she tries to become a player capable of beating the Soviet grand master who is the world champion, but Beth’s personal demons always threaten to overwhelm her as she struggles to live up to her full potential.
The amazing thing about this story is that it sounds like it could be pure misery porn, but it really isn’t. Yes, the lead is an orphan who has a very hard life in many ways including coping with addictions. Yet author Walter Tevis manages to keep the story from feeling grim, even when the circumstances really are.
I think this is because he’s more interested in how Beth reacts and copes with her problems rather than just dwelling on the ugliness of them. Even when she hits rock bottom and goes on an extended bender, we don’t wallow in the seedy picture of a young lady doing her best to drink herself into oblivion. Instead, by being in her head we see how she slides into this pattern because she doesn’t know how to deal with her issues rather than being some kind of narcissistic exercise in self-destruction.
Another thing Beth has to resolve is that the very nature of chess and studying it often means she spends a lot of time alone and in her own head which as a socially awkward person is how she often likes it, but she also has abandonment issues and also doesn’t really want to be alone. Since she’s her own worst enemy this is often a recipe for disaster. Plus, there’s been some chess masters who had mental health problems so for a woman who has her own issues, she’s uneasy about how going deep into the game might not be the best thing for her.
At the heart of the entire story is what it means to be a genius at anything. Beth has a natural talent that allows her to achieve a lot without much training, but because it’s all been easy for her she has to learn how to apply herself if she wants to become the world champion. When it’s been easy to be the best, it’s often hard to dig in and take the next step because talent will only get you so far in any field. When things get tougher, failure is always a possibility, and if there’s one thing Beth is frightened of, it’s failure.
Tevis also manages to make chess interesting in this. Like a lot of people, I know how to play, but I have no particular talent for it. His accounts of Beth’s games and study of it provide a glimpse into what it must be like to be a player at that level, and I actually found myself looking up some famous chess games and finding them fascinating.
It’s an extremely well written and sympathetic portrait of a woman struggling with her past and her talent. I’d already seen the Netflix show based on it, and it’s pretty faithful so there were no real surprises. Yet, I still found myself getting anxious about Beth and how she was doing both in her chess matches and in her life all over again....more
“Esssscuse me. Is this seat taken? Thanks. I like to sits bys the wimdow. Would you likes a little bit of wine? You know what they say, a little vino “Esssscuse me. Is this seat taken? Thanks. I like to sits bys the wimdow. Would you likes a little bit of wine? You know what they say, a little vino would be keen-o. No? Mores for me then. Oh, check it out. *BURP* WhatwasIsaying? Oh, sees that house over there going by? That used to be my house. True story. Me and my husbadand lived there. But the ole bastard cheated on me and lefts me and then he marriesss that stupid cow and then he knockeded her up and now they got a stupid cow kid and they lives in my house! Can you believes that? I means, it’s not my house now, but it usesed to be. Now he the rottens old bastard lives there with his stupids new wife and their stupid battery….Did I say battery? I meant baby. I’ve hads a few gin & tonics...And a little wine...*BURP*
Anyhows, letsus not talk about my stupid ole ex-husband. See that other house? The ones just a couple a few doors downs from my old one where you can totallys see their deck? A beausfiful couple lives there. They’re just the bestus. They’s just gorgeous and you can tells that they are for sure in loves 100%. You’d never catch *BURP* that guy cheatins on her, I can promise you that! I watch them every time I goes by on this here trainy-train with my glasses of wine as I ride, and I can just tell that their greatests most happiest couple who ever was…Lots better than the my stupid ole ex. Seeing them be such a absofantabulous couple rights by where I used to live is the one part of my stupid day I enjoy when I ride this train.
Wass that you say? She’s missing? Been in all the papers? Thattsus just terriblez… Geez, I can’t imagine how I *BURP* missed that news…. Since Saturday, you says? … I think I was down there last Saturday..Thass right. I remembers now. I had a couple of drinkies and went to sees my ole husband to tells him that I still love ‘em….Err.. I mean that I hate ‘em.. Thass right. I hate ‘em! But I had ones or twos too many, and I blacked out…. And I had a cut on my head the next day and a feeling that I’d seen something terribles…. Do ya think maybes I saw something? I better go *BURP* tell the cops about this….But first Imma gonna puke all over your shoes. Sorry about this……..”
*****
That’s what this book feels like, that you got stuck sitting next to a sloppy drunk who is telling you this story, and maybe you feel a little bad for her even as you’re trying to avoid her spilling her drink on you. After listening to her inebriated babblings for a very short while you immediately know more about her situation than she does, and you could easily tell her what she missed. But then you catch a whiff of her breath so you just try to sneak away when she’s not paying attention. Seriously, I might have liked this more if I hadn’t figured out who the culprit was about three minutes into the book....more
(I received a free advance copy of this via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)
Comedian and actor Patton Oswalt wrote this unflinching accoun(I received a free advance copy of this via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.)
Comedian and actor Patton Oswalt wrote this unflinching account of his battle with addiction during the late ‘90s, but he didn’t spend his days cooking meth with bikers or whoring himself out for crack. Poor Patton was a movie junkie who found plenty of dealers to get him high in the theaters of Los Angeles.
A double feature of Billy Wilder films at the New Beverly Cinema was the gateway drug that led Patton down a relentless path of devouring movies and cataloging them in a diary as well as notations in several film books he had. His work and his relationships suffered as he became unable to relate to other people’s every day interests that didn't involve movies, and he rationalized his behavior by thinking that it would eventually give him the insight to make a great film of his own. His descent continued until he hits bottom shortly after seeing Star Wars: The Phantom Menace. Which is understandable because a lot of us never felt like seeing a movie again after that one.
Ah, but seriously folks…
I noted in my review of Oswalt’s Zombie Spaceship Wasteland that I found the darker elements of that memoir intriguing, but that he’d seemed a little scared of making it too personal and sincere so he’d inserted segments of pure humor in it as deflections. Here we have him recounting a period when he feels like he let his love of movies of get the better of him, and how coming to terms with that changed the way he approached his own career as well as what was really important to him as a person. Since this is a professional comedian telling the story, it’s still funny, but it doesn’t seem like he’s using humor as a shield like it did in his previous book.
Here’s the tricky part for me about reviewing this: I’m a Patton Oswalt fan who finds him not only hilarious but also an actor capable of great work in both TV and film. I love reading about what creative people think about the process of actually turning ideas into something that can be shared. I’ll also confess to being a movie junkie. While I’ve never chased the dragon as hard as Patton did, I am the kind of person who is perfectly happy to kill an afternoon at a special showing of Seven Samurai or spend the better part of a day in a Marvel movie marathon. When Patton tells a story about seeing Last Man Standing and subjecting the friend he was with to the whole history of how it’s actually the same story as A Fistful of Dollars which is pretty much a remake of Kurosawa’s Yojimbo which was heavily influenced by Dashiell Hammet’s Red Harvest, it made me cringe because I said the same exact thing to the person I saw it with, too.
So this book obviously hit a sweet spot for me, but I could see another reader (Someone who doesn’t have their own custom I HATE! I HATE! coffee mug based on Oswalt’s Text routine.) maybe not liking this book quite so much. Such a person might point out that Patton is essentially berating his younger self for the time spent on his movie obsession rather than creating his own work as well as lamenting the time he didn’t spend with friends and family. And they’d have a valid point.
Because for all his self-criticism here it’s a little odd that Patton doesn’t give himself more credit for what he was accomplishing at the time which was turning himself into a top-notch comedian by performing relentlessly as well as landing regular work in the movies and on TV. Yeah, maybe he was on King of Queens for years instead of making his own Citizen Kane, but that helped him get to a point where he’s got to do other things like his great and disturbing performance as a sports nut in Big Fan. And now he’s married and has a daughter that he loves dearly so he figured out that whole work/life balance thing, right?
So what exactly is this guy bitching about? That he wasted a lot of time in the ‘90s watching movies? Hell, we all did that.
However, it the book works for you, then you‘ll find a lot more than that. It’s hard to break down the stew of events and small epiphanies that make us who we are, and that’s what Patton has tried to do here. He’s describing a period when he wasn't satisfied with what he was doing and was flailing around for answers by immersing himself obsessively in something he loved. He did finally learn something from all his time watching movies, but it wasn't what he went looking for. Maybe he didn’t become Quentin Tarantino, but he did grow into being Patton Oswalt. And like a lot of his fans, I’m happy it worked out that way.
Hey, I just got an email from Alamo Drafthouse telling me that they’re having a screening of The Apartment this weekend. Maybe I should check that out....
Most private detectives in the mystery genre get their cases when someone walks into their offices and hires them, but Nick Stefanos likes to do thingMost private detectives in the mystery genre get their cases when someone walks into their offices and hires them, but Nick Stefanos likes to do things a bit differently. For starters he doesn’t even have an office, and he gets his latest case by overhearing a murder when he’s too drunk to stop it. I don’t think that’s how Spenser or Elvis Cole would go about it.
Despite having a PI license, Nick spends most of his time pouring drinks at a dive bar called The Spot. After closing up one night, Nick goes on a blackout drunk that ends with him laying in a pile of a garbage in a park by a river. Nick is so plowed that when he hears two men shoot a teenager, he literally can’t lift a finger to help. Feeling guilty Nick sets out to track down the kid’s killers and gets hooked up with a straight arrow PI named Jack LaDuke who has been hired to find a friend of the dead teen who has gone missing.
The three books that Pelecanos wrote featuring Nick have been a vivid account of an alcoholic steadily falling further into the bottle, and this is definitely a low point. It’s telling that while Nick feels responsible for the young man’s death, he never once seriously considers quitting the booze. He could tell the police all he heard and head to an AA meeting, but Nick’s solution instead is to mount a dangerous investigation while still drinking every chance he gets.
While Nick is a good and decent guy at heart, there are times when you kind of wish someone would just kick his ass for being full of crap. As a chronic sentimentalist, Nick can put a layer of schmaltzy bullshit to his drinking rationalizations. He tells one person that The Spot has become a home for him and delights in the routine of pouring drinks for the regulars, but in reality it’s just a dirty bar filled with drunks that provides him easy access to the whiskey shots with beer chasers that he so dearly loves.
Despite his flaws, you can’t help but root for Nick and wish he’d pull himself together. That makes it that much worse when he pours the next shot and lights another cigarette. Nick may be willing to risk his life to see justice done, but he’d also rather die than make any changes that would potentially take the bottle out of his hand.
Dan, Anthony and I cracked open a bottle of Grand-Dad and discussed our thoughts about Nick. You can read it at Shelf Inflicted....more
I used to wonder how Phillip K. Dick came up with all the trippy concepts in his stories until I read A Scanner Darkly. That’s when I realized that thI used to wonder how Phillip K. Dick came up with all the trippy concepts in his stories until I read A Scanner Darkly. That’s when I realized that the drugs probably had a lot to do with it.
Originally published in 1977 and set in the mid ‘90s, the book tells the story of Bob Arctor. Arctor appears to be just another burned out druggie who lives with a couple of other dopers, and they spend most of their time getting high on Substance D and assorted other drugs. Bob is actually an undercover narc for the Orange County CA sheriff’s department, and in the future, the cops undercover are in so deep that even their bosses don’t know who they really are. Arctor wears a special scramble suit that blurs his features and voice when reporting to his boss Hank, who also wears a scramble suit to conceal his identity.
Bob has been trying to buy bigger quantities of Substance D from Donna, a spacey hash addict, so that he can work his way to the source, but he’s actually fallen in love with her even though she refuses to sleep with him. He gets a tricky new assignment when Hank orders him to start keeping tabs on a new target; Bob Arctor.
Since he can’t reveal his identity, Arctor has to play out the fiction that he’s investigating himself, but his brains have gotten so slushed from Substance D that he’s having a hard time keeping track of who he actually is.
Bob’s increasing confusion about identity and reality is the kind of theme that Dick specialized in, and Bob’s progressive meltdown is some of my favorite writing he did regarding that. However, while this has a thin veneer of sci-fi over it with the story being set in what was the near future, it‘s actually a chillingly realistic look at drug abuse. Dick spent a couple of years in the early ’70s where he ran with the Just Say Yes! crowd, and this book is a semi-autobiographical account of that time.
Where it really shines is in its portrayal of the drug culture with long sections dedicated to things like an addict who begins seeing bugs everywhere or a botched suicide attempt that turns into a psychedelic eternity of recrimination for past sins. The long rambling conversations with Bob and his fellow druggies are darkly hilarious in that they show a kind of weird creativity while also being completely devoid of logic and apt to go in paranoid directions. For example, a problem with a car eventually leads to their certainty that the cops have planted drugs in the house and that the only solution is to sell the place.
Dick does a masterful job of showing how people could end up living in a perpetual haze while ignoring the long term damage being done even as they see their own friends die or get turned into little more than vegetables by their own behavior. As he puts it, their sin was in wanting to play all the time but the penalty was far harsher than they deserved.
On a side note, I also loved the movie version of this done by Richard Linklater that featured a hand drawn rotoscope process over filmed scenes to give it a feeling of realistic unreality. Robert Downey Jr. and Woody Harrelson give great performances as Bob’s druggie housemates, and Keanu Reeves was born to play the brain fried Arctor. ...more
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