Speculative Fiction, Science Fiction, and Fantasy
in Los Angeles
DAYS BETWEEN
STATIONS by Steve
Erickson
This book got unbelievable
rave reviews from absolutely everyone, ranging from Thomas Pynchon to
the LAWeekly. For me, it was all I could do to get through it. It was
like reading something written by someone was in their second year of
film school, who decided to write a "meaningful, important, independent
book" instead of making a "meaningful, important, independent
film". Ugh. What a complete waste of time.
I heard of this book
when someone saw my review of Expiration Date and thought that if I liked
one, I'd like the other. Unfortunately, nothing could be further from
the truth. Given
all the high praise, maybe, in all fairness, I just didn't get it. But
I am so not willing to read it again to find out.
EXPIRATION DATE by Tim Powers
This book takes more
than one reading - I liked it the first time, but it took a year or so,
with some acquired knowledge of some of LA's history, to truly appreciate
it. This is one of the books that you pick up every so often and read
all over again, just for kicks. From the history of Aimee Semple McPherson
to the reason that the street people in LA look the way they do, this
book covers LA in all its trashy glory. You'll never look at Los Angeles
the same way again.
from the hardcover:
"Young Kootie Paraganas is growing up in Los Angeles in the 1990's,
but his parents won't let him do anything normal. His weirdo parents venerate
the spirits of dead Mahatmas. At the age of eleven, Kootie has disobeyed
his parents, broken into a plaster bust of Dante, stolen the small glass
vial concealed inside it, and set in motion events that will change his
own life and everyone else's. For trapped in the vial was the preserved
ghost of Thomas Alva Edison, and there is not telling what the power of
possession of that ghost could confer. The exposure of Edison's ghost
lights up a beacon for those who can see such things. Koot is pursued
through the dark underside of the city, aided by allies as strange as
his enemies: a bum and his dog; a man concealed by the ghostly mark of
Houdini; a psychiatrist-sorceress; and a former television child-star
who has been dead for several years, but who is not yet ready to leave
his body or abandon his revenge on the woman who murdered his godfather."
from the paperback:
"Los Angeles is filled with ghosts--and half-ghosts, and ghost hunters,
and ghost junkies--chasing each other in a mad quest for immortality.
As a series of disasters strikes Los Angeles, a young boy inhales the
last breath of Thomas Edison, and becomes a precious prize in a deadly
hunt for the elusive vital spark. Brimming with the wild imagination and
heart-stopping escapades that won Tim Powers the World Fantasy Award,
Expiration Date is an exuberant and inventive tale from one of fantasy's
most original talents."
from the flyleaf:
"L.A.: the sparkling metropolis at the new center of what's left
of the civilized world. Here wealthy men and women seek forbidden thrills
through a system that enables them to indulge safely and anonymously in
their wildest fantasies through the use of computerized simulations known
as prowlers. Then a young executive at one of the world's most powerful
corporations is brutally slain and an ex-information cop named McNihil
is called in to find the dead man's still "living" prowler. McNihil knows
he's walking into a trap. But he wants a chance to redeem himself for
a botched job that forced him into retirement years ago. Teamed with a
ruthless female operative called November, McNihil is about to enter a
world in which no one can be trusted and things are far worse than they
seem...a world in which a vast conspiracy of evil is about to blur the
razor-thin line between the sane safety of daylight and the dark danger
of Noir."
Naturally, with a
title like this, we had to read it. We were dismayed by Jeter's follow-up
Blade Runner novel, and so it was with trepedation that I began this book.
Maybe it's because he's writing in his own world rather than trying to
work within someone else's but this is a definite improvement. Not the
fastest or easiest read in the world, but worth the effort.
From the back cover:
"Hap is a receiver at REMtemp, working during the night hours, having
people's dreams for them. Hap is one of the best REMtemp has ever seen.
He's so good they offer him some under-the-cover work--taking on memories
instead of dreams for clients who have something to forget. And in a world
falling apart at the seams, there's no shortage of business. All Hap has
to do is carry the memories for a couple of hours. Just long enough for
a client to have an affair without guilt. Or pass a lie detector test
for a crime she suddenly can't remember. Everyone wins. Until a beatiful
young woman who committed murder leaves Hap her memory...and won't take
it back. Now Hap is on the run. The LAPD wants him for homicide. Six angels
of death in grey suits and sunglasses are leaving a trail of dead bodies
in his wake. And there's a contract out on his life that has just been
picked up by the best hit man in the business: his ex-wife. And if that's
not enough to give him the willies, people all around Hap are disappearing
in a strange white light."
The paranormal. UFOs. Angels. The Bible. A guy who claims
he's God. The key to it all may be buried somewhere deep in Hap's past.
Now all he has to do is stay alive long enough to remember the most important
thing of all--whether or not he's one of us."
Nocturne's
number one book! We've bought more copies of this book than any
other - we give it away, we loan it out, we re-read it... and no matter
how many times we pick it up, we can't put it down till it's finished.
Fast and funny - there's nothing in life that can't be commented on simply
by quoting a line from the book.
From the back cover:
"From the opening line of his breakthrough cyberpunk novel Snow Crash,
Neal Stephenson plunges the reader into a not-too-distant future. It is
a world where the Mafia controls pizza delivery, the United States exists
as a patchwork of corporate-franchise city-states, and the Internet--incarnate
as the Metaverse--looks something like last year's hype would lead you
to believe it should. Enter Hiro Protagonist--hacker, samurai swordsman,
and pizza-delivery driver. When his best friend fries his brain on a new
designer drug called Snow Crash and his beautiful, brainy ex-girlfriend
asks for his help, what's a guy with a name like that to do? He rushes
to the rescue. A breakneck-paced 21st-century novel, Snow Crash interweaves
everything from Sumerian myth to visions of a postmodern civilization
on the brink of collapse. Faster than the speed of television and a whole
lot more fun, Snow Crash is the portrayal of a future that is bizarre
enough to be plausible." (1993)
William Gibson calls it "Fast-forwarded free-style mall mythology for
the 21st Century."
Timothy Leary
called it "A fantastic, slam-bang-overdrive, supersurrealistic, comic-spooky
whirl through a tomorrow that is already happening. Neal Stephenson is
intelligent, perceptive, hip and will become a major force in American
writing."
If
you're outrageously rich, occasional hard covers are available on
