30 August, 2001: Bright Orange for the Shroud
I think that something happened to pulp fiction after Red Harvest or The Postman Always Rings Twice; there was some line that was crossed, and ever after traditional morality could be effaced in favor of a purely America ideology of competence and machismo. The beauty of John MacDonald's Travis McGee series, of which Bright Orange for the Shroud is an excellent example, is that it reasserted a certain moral weight (the uncharitable might say "ponderousness") and contemplativeness while still asserting those dual pulp values. McGee is not averse to violence, nor is he scrupulously honest (Bright Orange for the Shroud has McGee attempting to con a group of con men who duped a friend out of his life savings; McGee, as per his standard practice, will take half of anything he can get back), but there's a moral rightness to his actions. The McGee books also have some sharply defined characterization, a strong supporting cast (McGee's best friend Meyer is sadly lacking in Bright Orange), well-written female characters, and some rather interesting musings on the state of Florida (environmentally) and America (socialy) in the late Sixties. Bright Orange's plot also features a clear explanation of the workings of a big con, a female lead who McGee doesn't sleep with, a nastier-than-usual villain, and (unusually) McGee screwing up at least twice. An excellent book in a quite good series.
1:47 am 
26 August, 2001: American Pharaoh
I hate to be dismissive of American Pharaoh; it's a decently-written and obviously thoroughly-researched biography of a complex and emblematic man. But while I was reading, I couldn't help but think that the authoritative book on Daley has already been written. (It's Boss, by the late Chicago columnist Mike Royko.) American Pharaoh was, oddly enough, most interesting when it wasn't strictly focused on its subject. (more...)
11:42 pm
17 August, 2001: Citizen of the Galaxy
Citizen of the Galaxy was the second book that I read while trying to fall asleep at my parents' house. I'm admirer of Heinlein's yarn-spinning talents, and Citizen reminded me why that is; it's one of Heinlein's better juveniles, I think, and parts of it -- the Free Traders and the Rudbek of Rudbek bits are quite well done and kept me reading, even though I knew the outcome and was gnashing my teeth. But I'm not a huge Heinlein fan, and this book reminded me of that, as well. (more...)
1:34 am
14 August, 2001: Planet Patrol
Stuck at my parents' for an evening and stricken with insomnia, I pulled some of my old books off the shelves. I have faint recollection of reading Sonya Dorman's Planet Patrol three or four times when I was young (and by "young" I mean nine or ten years old). I'm not entirely sure why -- perhaps it was the novelty of having a science fiction hardback of my very own. This isn't a fabulously interesting book to an adult reader; it's the story of a rookie cop working for the world government in the unstated future, and I can see bits that remind me of the boot camp sequences of Starship Troopers, only nicer. Everything in this book is very nice: the principal antagonist, a Venetian colonist, is an insurgent against said world government, but honorable; scenes break off before things get too ugly; the protagonist dances through some unpleasant situations, but nothing ever really goes too badly for her. My seventh-grade English teacher was right: without conflict, fiction really is dull. (Of more interest, perhaps, is the totally understated assumption that a benevolent and democratic world government could spring up without widespread rebellion on Earth and resultant repression, but I'll chalk that one up to the general mood of the late '70s.)
10:48 pm
10 August, 2001: The Stress of Her Regard
I am not kidding when I say that I read a lot of science fiction. I've probably read at least a thousand science fiction paperbacks, conceivably two or three times that. But I've never been much of a fantasy fan. I've read Tolkien, and in junior high I read a lot of Tolkien ripoffs, but the number of (non-children's) fantasy writers whose work I'd consider reading now is probably in the single digits. Tim Powers, however, is high in the list. The Stress of Her Regard is not Powers' best book (I'm probably in the minority on this, but I'd lean toward his Vegas-gangsters-and-Jungian-archetypes novel Last Call), but any novel featuring a dyspeptic Byron, a doomed Keats, the vampiric secret of artistic success, and the secret history of the Hapsburg conquest of Italy is the kind of fantasy novel I'll read. It's frequently clunky (aluminum? "Sentient life on earth"??), has some awkward coincidences, and is stretched out too far at the end with said (unnecessary, but very Powersish) secret history bits, but it's quite enjoyable, even on the reread.
1:48 am
2 August, 2001: The Space Merchants
It's a terrible disappointment to revisit a book you remember enjoying and not be thrilled. Frederik Pohl and C.M. Kornbluth's The Space Merchants is well thought of, and I remember enjoying it when I read it in high school, but it just didn't have any zip when I reread it. Maybe that's because Pohl and Kornbluth's satire -- a world run by advertising agencies, a world of hucksterism gone mad -- just doesn't hold up to real events. (more...)
1:03 am