William Denton wrote:
> [ GUN, WITH OCCASIONAL MUSIC (1994) ]
>I'm rereading it for SF month. So far I'm enjoying
much more than I
>remembered liking it the first time. At the time, I
thought as I did
>about some other mystery/SF books: the SF was very
well done but the
>writer couldn't pull of the mystery side as
well.
>
GUN is an early novel, and I can forgive the mystery
side problems in the same way I've forgiven worse from other
first-time novelists
(McGivern, Crais, Block, Wahloo, Rankin to name a few).
However, when other novelists might hit their stride by the
second or third novel, Lethem moved on to other genres.
>Has anyone else been reading Lethem recently? Looking
through the
>archives I see we talked about him on and off in 1999
and 2000, because of
>MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN, but not a lot since
then.
>
>
>
I've read all of Lethem's books, with the exception of
GIRL IN LANDSCAPE (which came up on the list in the context
of plots which resemble the THE SEARCHERS). It seems to me
that Lethem doesn't get too much discussion here because
although MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN and GUN both fit within genre
limits of the group, he doesn't embrace the genre. Even
BROOKLYN is mostly about the main characters growth, and the
mystery takes a back seat. A full third of the book is
devoted to the protagonist's childhood.
As Mr. Lochte noted, there really isn't anything in his
latest, FORTRESS, which would qualify for discussion on this
list. My guess is that he won't be coming back, but it's
always hard to predict what someone will do when they change
directions all the time.
Cheers,
--Stewart
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