2 Reviews

So North of Sunset got its first bad Amazon review, from someone who liked Oscar Caliber Gun. I’m not totally surprised, but it’s still a bummer. I figured this would happen with some people who read OCG and liked the hard-boiled, angry narrator which is not as present in NoS. I think more people will like NoS than OCG, actually, it’s broader, but those who like OCG seem to believe in it more. If you read NoS and liked it, feel free to leave a comment on Amazon (now available) and tell him how wrong he is.

Matthew Selznick, author of Brave Men Run, writes up the book. Mostly very nice, but says the first third is too slow. Another thing I was anticipating being criticized. Spends some time setting up the characters. I justify it by saying it’s like a Hollywood movie, where in the first ten minutes people get to speak dialogue outside the lines of the plot, and after the plot starts rolling it’s all they think about.

The new novel’s getting even further away from hard-boiled noir writing. I don’t feel like going back there. Closer to Robert Anton Wilson’s Illuminatus trilogy and PK Dick’s Valis novels. If I do it right. Different sorts of readers read that than crime fiction. I just ordered up RA Wilson's Masks of the Illuminati, which I haven’t read. Found a copy of Caleb Carr’s Killing Time and Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon the other day for two dollars. That’s where my head’s at.