Re: RARA-AVIS: Rankin

From: Robert Centor ( rcentor@yahoo.com)
Date: 03 Jan 2002


Several comments concerning Rankin.

1. You are correct - it helps to read them in order. I believe his writing and plotting has improved over time.

2. I am very impressed with his writing - especially in his more recent books. The latest US release - the Falls - is very well written.

3. The New York Times has a nice article about him today -

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/03/books/03RANK.html

4. I personally find Rankin the most intriguing writer of the genre. But as my father always says "De gustibus non disputandum est"

--- Carrie Pruett < pruettc@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> I don't really get the Rankin/Ellroy comparison - Rankin does tend to have
> fairly convoluted plots but his prose is pretty straightforward and the
> stories are basic police procedural stuff, with a loner aspect thrown in
> that makes them feel more like PI novels at times. There are certainly some
> "corruption of social institutions"/ police brutality type themes that you
> usually find in HB, but I don't get the "moral sickness permeating all
> levels of society" feel that I took from Ellroy. I'm not overwhelmed with
> the quality of Rankin's writing - not that it's bad, but fairly workmanlike
> most of the time - but the stories are pretty good and the characters are
> fun. I've read maybe half a dozen of these and my favorite is "The Hanging
> Garden"; I haven't read "The Black book" though, and I have a hunch this
> series ought to be read in order (which I haven't done) in order to get the
> whole flavor of the stories. I generally have trouble keeping track of who
> Rebus is working or sleeping with in any given book, but it's such a long
> series that I haven't disciplined myself to sit down and read them in order
> yet. The one I read most recently, "Dead Souls" I thought had the potential
> to be a Great Book, but the story went off on so many tangents (I counted
> five separate plots, any of which could be considered the "main" plot of the
> book, at least one of which - excon stalking Rebus - could have been
> eliminated to the great improvement of the book) that the final impact was
> sort of lost on me.
>
>
> Carrie
>
>
>
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