Wonkers' - and anyone else who wants to join - Book Club - The Neon Rain (James Lee Burke)

[BecauseImWorthIt]

OK - just setting up the thread.

Anyone is welcome to join!

The first book is The Neon Rain, the first Dave Robicheaux book by James Lee Burke.

The plan is to start the discussion from 5 July, so you've got three weeks to find/buy/borrow and read the book!

hmmm - I finished this a couple of days ago - I thought the sense of place was beautifully done - I know this sounds silly, but I'd had no idea that New Orleans was so 'foreign' and different from, say, East coast America.

However, I thought the plot was pretty uneven and although the 'baddies' were well-drawn and compelling, Robicheaux himself was a bit of a cipher, and I found myself getting quite irritated by the whole 'flawed detective' thing = he's divorced, but somehow is devastatingly attractive to women even when he's behaving appallingly ...

And I fail to see how an alcoholic could do that much exercise! out on a bender one night, out for a 5 mile run the next morning

I think his character is much better drawn in the rest of the books, bb.

My interpretation of the amount of exercise is that it's based on guilt/self-loathing for his falling off the wagon - his own punishment.

BiWi - do the later books go into any "reasons" for his difficulties with intimacy (which seemed to be hinted at) - or does the author not take that route?

Ah. Now you're asking

I have a terrible memory for story details!

But actually he does find 'true love' and it's very touching - won't say any more as it would spoil things. As well as the fact I can't remember how/when this comes about.

That's interesting about the love thing developing.

I was a bit surprised by the "distance" between the narrator and the woman, and wondered whether it was deliberate, or whether it was that crime fiction often generates quite opaque "other" characters.

Have you ever read any "Hannah Wolf" stories (was it Gillian Slovo who wrote those??). But she took the "p.i. who is not so good with people" trope and ran with it (Hannah "Lone" Wolf). Her character had a (rather put-upon) boyfriend, and in one story what initially looked like an under-drawing of a "background" character (ie "the boyfriend") turned out to be a crisis in her relationship. So it played off the characteristics (and expectations) of the genre, with gender expectations, and, I guess, the gender of the author and readers.

Anyway ... I wondered how Dave Robicheaux would use that ... .

Genre fiction is fascinating for its cargo, isn't it? I know it's a cliche, but it's both a prison, of sorts, and a potentially really useful tool.

I wondered if New Orleans functioned a bit like the genre - ie. he's inhabiting an old city, of old architecture, and old stories, with lots of history, but lived in by each generation, and individual in their own way, within limits?

Oh goodness animula. I haven't a clue!

My problem is - despite having a literature degree - that I always want to read books for the story and to find out what happens in the end!

I used to always have to read any text first just to find out what happened, and then go back to appreciate the way in which it was written.

I'm so jealous of crime writers; they're always good at stories/plots, aren't they? I've realised that is my great difficulty - the narrative thread. In life and in writing ... .

By the way, I forgot to say thank you for choosing the book, Biwi - I'd not heard of him before.

And hello BasildonBond.

... but what did permeate into my brain was his writing style, especially the beautiful descriptive elements of the local area.

From the portion I read of it I was interested in the straight-bat, mildly encouraging, responses the main character gives to those he talks with, reflecting them back to themselves. It made him seem like a psychotherapist who just turns what you say back, benignly but rather infuriatingly, and strategically hides himself. A good strategy for a reserved person, and for a detective who is constantly trying to get people to reveal thenselves more than they meant to. And I imagine a trope of the genre. (Feel very self-conscious using the word 'trope' which sounds all lit crit and University of East Anglia to me.)

Well that is what he did with the first two people. Third person, less psychodynamically he just threatened with a knife.

I must admit I find it uphill work, but am reading the thread with interest. Liked very much what animula said about city and genre. I suppose all fiction, not just genre fiction, is like that a bit. A landscape of devices saturated with meanings conveyed by its previous occupants? But genre fiction more so, obv.

I didn't notice that (the psychotherapy-style mirroring back).

I guess that how detectives in crime novels elicit information is quite crucial to the plot and the genre, isn't it?

I used to get so annoyed with crime novels where the detective was "behind" the clues. ie. either the "solution" was so obvious (partly because of genre expectations) that I "got" it before they did, or if the detective was really "clumsy" and their sole function seemed to be to wander around, making mistakes, until the "solution" falls out in the ensuing chaos. I know some authors "play" with that.

I think Donna Leon's detective often makes things worse, not better, doesn't he? Or I may be thinking of someone else, there. I think perhaps he's one of the "chaos" detectives. And there's a female one who annoys me to bits, but I can't remember who .... And for the first variety (genre expectations), I guess that's how "Scream" works, isn't it? though that's a horror movie franchise, rather than crime fiction ....

Again, it's one of the things that you can play with, I guess, when you have such an established genre.

But I really hadn't noticed Mr Neon's interview technique at all. It's an intriguing idea.

Crucial to marking out the points of "indivduality" within the genre, too, I suppose ... .

Drunk sheep! That's worse than zombie cows probably.

I just deleted a long post about the police in Crime and P and in The Trial. Too off-topic, but really interesting across the board the role that coppers have in fiction. Not surprisingly given that they can play on the guilt that has also to be pervasive.

You're too hasty with that delete button!

Can I put forward a proposal for permission to range a little wide? I'm prepared to have it voted down. but points in favour are that

a. I like general discussion, on themes and so on, anyway.

b. A general discussion allows people to chip in, even if they haven't read the whole of a particular book.

c. And I like "reading for connections" just generally. So I do kind of treasure those generalised insights that pop up.

But I recognise that other people might find that infuriating ... . So, i offer it to a vote.

Those zombie cows were great. And I'm now remembering the sinister sheep. I really liked those.

C and P and The Trial analogies fascinating. It's almost making me want to write a crime novel. But I am rubbish at plots. Which is a shame. I do love genre fiction. Somehow its rules v. individuality dynamic really appeals to me.

Now. i have to say this. Where are all the others? I'm guessing one or two haven't read the book yet. In a RL bookclub, I guess they'd be arriving a little flustered, and filling us in with RL events that came between themselves and Neon Rain.

at 2/3 "points in favour" being "I like it." I guess I'm honest.

That sounds sensible to me animula.

I tried again with the book last night and was interested in the bit where some woman in a car rescues Dave from bad cops, and in the process drives very recklessly and fast so that he has to ask her to slow down etc.

I think I have seen that device a few times in films? A woman's character is introduced as being outside of the gender-role of conventional obedience by her taking the hero on a wild ride that unnerves him just a little. Sets her up as 'strong and independent' and also gratifies the hero's and male readers' desire to be dominated just a bit (tho he is still kept in charge by his mansplaining reminders to drive more calmly)