REVIEW--SCOTT ADLERBERG'S JUNGLE HORSES

Hi Folks,

I'd like to recommend a fantastic book I just read, Scott Adlerberg's JUNGLE HORSES. Here's my review of it: 

 

Review of Scott Adlerberg’s JUNGLE HORSES

Every great once in awhile, as a writer, I come upon a book that serves as a wake-up call as to why I originally wanted to be a writer and reignites that original fever. The first books I read that excited me about literature were novels that created entirely new worlds out of whole cloth. The Jules Verne novels, the Edgar Rice Burroughs tales, the stories set in places like nowhere on earth. And then, as time went on and I became more and more inured into writing professionally, I kind of forgot that original excitement. Well, it was just reignited. I picked up a copy of Scott Adlerberg’s newest novel, JUNGLE HORSES, and instantly felt like I was 7 or 8 again, racing through 10,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA or TARZAN OF THE APES. I was immediately transported into a world that had never existed before and it was just plain exhilarating! This was a writer who was obviously the kid the English teacher back in the eighth grade singled out when she announced to the class that this kid had a wonderful imagination. Too often, as we get older and more jaded, we keep using the same old settings and same old plots and when you happen on a story like JUNGLE HORSES, it feels like it does when a Santa Ana comes down out of the mountains in L.A. and blows all the smog out to sea and the air gets crisp and clean and your lungs feel like new.

I’ll leave it to others to describe the plot, except to say that it involves a degenerate gambler, a weird sexual triad with one of the players impotent, and an island that I think broke off from the island of Dr. Moreau and drifted a few leagues away. And horses. It almost doesn’t matter what the plot is—it’s a dream and you enter into it immediately and willingly. Because of its atmospheric quality, it will be tempting to call it a work of noir, but it has a higher and reaches it—this is literature and literature of the highest quality.

I’ll leave the plot details to the cover copy, which describes it as:

Arthur lives a quiet life in London, wandering from the bar to the racetrack and back again. When his pension check dries up, Arthur decides to win it all back with one last big bet at the bookie. When that falls through, Arthur borrows money and repeats the process, until he's in too deep with a vicious gang of leg-breakers.

The plan to save his skin will take him far from his home, to a place where a very different breed of horse will change his life forever.

I have no idea why, but the entire time I was transported into Adlerberg’s tale, I kept thinking I was reading a story by William Goyen. I think it was the voice he employed.

I’m just thankful for coming upon a story that reminded me of why I wanted to be a writer. I feel like my own roots have been rejuvenated. It’s a wonderful thing to be reminded of the possibilities of story.

Pick up a copy--you'll be glad you did!

Blue skies,

Les

SCOTT ADLERBERG'S MYSTERIOUS ISLAND: The Bitch by Les Edgerton

SCOTT ADLERBERG'S MYSTERIOUS ISLAND: The Bitch by Les Edgerton: I'm a huge admirer of Les Edgerton's novel THE RAPIST, so when I started his novel THE BITCH, I had high expectations.  Not that I w...



Hi folks,



Well... today's the day! The day my novel THE BITCH launches from New Pulp Press. And, here's the first review from author Scott Adlerberg and it's a corker!

SCOTT ADLERBERG'S MYSTERIOUS ISLAND

On Books, Writing, Movies, and Whatever Else.

Monday, January 20, 2014

The Bitch by Les Edgerton

I'm a huge admirer of Les Edgerton's novel THE RAPIST, so when I started
his novel THE BITCH, I had high expectations.  Not that I was expecting
to read a book remotely like THE RAPIST, a masterpiece of  the darkest
type of existential crime fiction, but I had little doubt that I'd be in
the hands of a crime fiction practitioner par excellence.  How pleasant
it is when your expectations are met, when a writer you've set the
highest standard for meets that standard and exceeds it.



THE BITCH is about Jake Bishop, an ex-con in Indiana who has a lovely young wife, a baby on the way, and a teenaged brother he's caring for.  Jake was once a burglar, but since his last stint in jail, he has done his best to stay straight. And he's
succeeded.  He has a trade - he's a hairstylist in a salon - and he has
ambition: he and his wife are saving money to start their own salon.  He
used to drink too much but hasn't fallen off the wagon in a long time.
Things seem pretty good. Of course, in a book like this, in noir land,
if things seem okay, you know they won't be okay for long.  Everything
will turn sour quickly. And for Jake life begins to rot the day his old
cellmate turns up asking him for a favor.  The cellmate's name is Walker
Joy, and from the moment Bishop makes the mistake of letting Joy back
into his life, Bishop experiences precious little of that particular
word. 



It's no secret that Les Edgerton did time himself, years ago.  And in all Jake's thoughts and descriptions about jail there is an authenticity that I'm sure in part derives from
Edgerton's experience.  But living through something and writing about
it are two entirely different things, and what makes THE BITCH such a
great read is Edgerton's flat-out skill.  Though he may be drawing upon
past experience for his raw material, it's the imagination he applies to
that material and the substantial craft he wields that make
this book work.  THE BITCH is a novel that unfolds in a way both
entirely plausible and heavily plotted, no small feat.  There are twists
and turns galore, yet nothing that happens seems forced or arbitrary. 
Indeed, while reading the novel, I felt as if I was reading a textbook
example of a particular type of noir story.  It's the crime story where
one wrong decision by the main character, just one, is enough to send
his entire life sliding downhill.  It doesn't matter if the decision
is based on an honorable intention.  Bishop knows helping Walker is not
the wisest decision, but he feels he owes the man because Walker helped
him a lot in prison. Walker even saved his life in prison.  Naturally, Walker
brings up this debt, and that's where he hooks Bishop.  Never mind that
the debt is related to prison garbage that has nothing to do with the
outside world. Bishop feels he must honor it.  His sense of having a
cellmate code, his loyalty to the past - these are his weaknesses.  He
agrees to help Walker and from that instant, the die is cast.  THE BITCH
unfolds like a nightmare after that; a mixture of bad judgment, small
lies, mental errors, and plain old bad luck enfold Bishop in a web of
deceit and criminal acts that threaten to destroy everything he's built
since he last got released from prison.  It's almost as if, his
statements to the contrary, he can't wait to go back to jail.



And who exactly is the Bitch?  Whatis the Bitch? It's not a woman, I can tell you that, because no woman dreamt up by a man, even a women-fearing man, could be as terrifying as this sucker.  The Bitch pertains to something relevant for a repeat
offender like Jake, and it hangs over his every move like the oppressive
hand of Fate.  Does he control anything?  The thing in life he least
wants to do is return to prison, and nearly everything he does as his
situation worsens he does to avoid returning to prison, but the image of
the Bitch plagues his thoughts night and day.  He struggles against the
magnetic pull of the Bitch, and though we don't want to get optimistic
reading a work of noir like this, we hope against hope that he can
resolve his situation well. For the duration of the book, I was rooting
for Jake to pull off the seemingly impossible, and that I cared so much
for him is a testament to Edgerton's ability to make you understand
Jake. You understand everything that makes him tick, and despite his
actions, you sympathize with him. You're willing to forgive him almost
anything to see him escape the vise he's in.



If I were teaching a course on literary noir, THE BITCH is a book I'd choose for class study.  It's perfectly constructed and has nary a wasted word.  It's a stark tale of a man
fighting as hard as he can against himself, the world, Nature, Fate; and
it's a book that, once started, you don't want to put down.  It's the
kind of book an old Hollywood master like Fritz Lang would have made a
great film from, and I can only hope someone in today's film biz still
reads novels and finds this one.  Finds it, and then decides to adapt
it.  It would make a wonderful movie.  And by the way, while I'm at it,
let me throw out a word of thanks to New Pulp Press for re-issuing this.
THE BITCH deserves a wide audience. 

Thank you so much, Scott! This was a wonderful way to start my day! And, sorry for the jumbled way it appeared here--my bad entirely! I did a cut and paste and this is the way it turned out and I'm a total doofus in doing things like this.

Click on the cover for ordering info--it's available both as an ebook and as a paperback.


Blue skies,

Les

REVIEW OF SCOTT ADLERBERG'S SPIDERS AND FLIES

Hi folks,



When I was at the recent Bouchercon I had the pleasure of meeting and hanging out with Scott Adlerberg. And, then, when I got back home, I read his novel. I wish now I'd read his novel before meeting him! It's an amazing piece of work and I would have liked to tell him in person my opinion of it and talk to him about it. I guess I'll just tell him here what I thought...

The whole time I sat reading Scott Adlerberg’s novel SPIDERS AND FLIES, I kept thinking of the movie ANGEL HEART starring Mickey Rourke. And couldn’t figure out why at first. The stories aren’t similar, other than both contain supernatural elements, but the movie was set mostly in New Orleans and a bit in New York City, whereas Adlerberg’s novel takes place mostly in Martinique. And then it struck me. It physically and emotionally felt the same in both experiences—both forms cast a spell with atmospheric and nightmarish qualities that permeated my senses. Close to what Jung meant when he spoke of the realm of the subconscious being where truth resides. Adlerberg uses language in the best way—to create a film in the mind.

If you took the plot and outlined it, it probably wouldn’t make much sense. It certainly isn’t realistic or a portrayal of life from any “real” world. This isn’t the kind of noir that features meth addicts slashing and gashing their way through a redneck environment. This is noir of the highest order—the darkness of the soul and the nightmare we all seek to avoid but always know is there.

I think that’s why I kept thinking of ANGEL HEART. This was the first and perhaps only film I’ve ever seen that portrayed New Orleans accurately, with its dark undercurrents of savagery and primitivism. Unlike those horrid films like THE BIG EASY which were laughable and from which many native New Orleanians walked out of its showing in NOLA, either laughing or shaking their fists at the portrayal of a city that movie misinterpreted entirely. ANGEL HEART got New Orleans spot on and SPIDERS AND FLIES gets noir spot on. Certain of Faulkner’s novels do the same. Where this novel’s beauty lies is in the author’s tremendous skill in using language to beguile and bewitch and herd us into that place many writers try to take us to—the fictive dream. And, that’s exactly what Adlerberg has created—a dream that you enter into. This is not a reading experience a Grisham fan would probably enjoy. It is a novel a Genet fan would appreciate.

If this gets made into a movie, I’d look for a younger version of Mickey Rourke to play the lead. It’s perfect for the Rourke of ANGEL HEART or KILLSHOT. Directed by Hector Babenco, with the same kind of chops he brought to THE KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN.

Try to read this novel when you can experience it straight through. Put the DO NOT DISTURB sign on your door…

Blue skies,

Les