thanks for the comments on invented cities. I'm specifically
more interested in authors who have invented cities or
neighborhoods with pretty highly developed
social/geographic/historical structure, not so much the
"santa barbara, thinly disguised" stuff that Grafton does,
where basically just the names are changed. Like Faulkner's
Yonknapatawpha or however the hell you spell it - Lehane's
Buckingham in "Mystic River" is like this. The details about
the Point and the Flats at the beginning are so well-done -
specific but universal at the same time - that I assumed it
must be a real place. A nice solution to the problems he ran
into with the Dorchester books, where he's admitted that he
writes more about the neighborhood of his youth than the way
it is today.
DARKNESS TAKE MY HAND - This is the second Patrick Kenzie -
Angie >Gennaro book by Dennis Lehane. I have a couple of
quibbles. I don't >know why Lehane doesn't refer to the
newspapers as The Globe and The >Herald.
I've noticed writers often don't use the names of real
papers, I wonder if this is a copyright or liability issue.
In some cases the reason is obvious
(Laura Lippman did and perhaps still does write for the
Baltimore Sun so it's politic to turn it into the "Beacon
Light" - esp. cause she can then call it the "Blight").
>I've noticed
>The other is that the man Patrick is following goes
to Bryce College >in
>Brookline. That's where I grew up. The streets and
even the theater
> >Patrick follows him into are authentic, but not
only is no similar
> >school in the town, there is no room in the town
for a college.
re: the above, Lehane definitely plays looser with geography
than some writers; Pelecanos and Connelly always take pains
to locate their action in real places; even if the address
isn't exactly right, I'm sure I could find the intersection
where the Spot is, and any tourist can find DuPont Circle. In
the case of "Bryce," I assume Lehane didn't want to mention a
real college because there are some rather nasty goings on at
the campus, I recall. There are enough small colleges in the
Boston area that it basically feels right, though.
>I also found a fairly major error. Towards the
beginning Patrick and >Angie
>meet with the local Mafia head whom Angie ascertains
owes >allegiance to
>the Patriso family. She then states she is the only
>granddaughter of the
>Patriso's don. This fact is repeated again in the
>book, but later on we
>learn Angie has a sister, Renee. I guess Lehane
>can later correct this by
>making Renee a half sister, but it's a
flaw
Yeah, this is a pretty glaring inconsistency. He could clear
it up but I don't think he ever does. I try to just block
that bit of backstory out of my mind, because Patrick having
been married to Angie's sis is just ooky AFAIC. Lehane's
books often gives me the impression of several drafts being
cobbled together and this was particularly strong in
"Darkness."
("Gone Baby Gone" is extremely well-plotted and put together,
IMO, but that's the exception proving the rule). I actually
sort of enjoy the messiness of Lehane's books - gives a
feeling of energy and spontaneity that I like. But things
like this will slip in from time to time. A more subtle but
interesting gaffe in "Mystic" - the opening paragraph of the
book is a lovely riff on how Jimmy and Sean's fathers worked
in a candy factory and because the smell permeated their
homes, neither of them could stand sweets.
Later in the book, though, Jimmy has some kind of
reminiscence about what a condescending kid Sean was, how he
made a big gesture out of something like sharing a candy bar
- something that, based on the first paragraph of the book
would never have happened. This hints that the opening was
written later (which is consistent with Lehane's own account
of writing the book, which is that he started with the
opening of part 2).
Lest somebody be tempted to say "get a life," I'm purely
interested in this detail for the insight into the writing
process. (OK, you can still tell me to get a life). There's
always Faulkner's wonderful introduction to the one volume
edition of the Snopes trilogy (3 books written over 30+years)
that says something on the lines that the author has
discovered more inconsistencies and contradictions than the
reader could possibly realize and that he attributes the
inconsistencies to knowing more about the mysteries of the
human condition than he did when he started. And another
great quote in one of Reginald Hill's books, to the effect
that you can write a masterpiece and no one notices, but get
one thing wrong and readers will email you from 5
continents.
Didn't something nasty befall Angie's father in the past? I'm
trying to remember that story, might give some insight into
the paternity of Renee. I did remember thinking if he writes
another P&A book, he'll probably pick up with Angie's
family history.
Carrie
*****************
"When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was
drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball
Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma,
California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring
afternoon."
-James Crumley, "The Last Good Kiss"
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