I should clarify something. High Rise, Ballard's follow up to Concrete
Island, was the book that moved his theme of alienation from cars to
buildings and artificial communities. Cocaine Nights represents a
return to the 20-years after it first appears.
On Fri, Jul 25, 2008 at 6:49 PM, Nathan Cain <indiecrime@gmail.com> wrote:
> I have read Cocaine Nights, which is definitely a crime novel, might
> be of interest. It's been a while since I've read it, but it deals
> with a happy, shiny resort community in Spain that has some dark
> secrets. It marks a continuation of Ballard's theme of mankind's
> alienation from one another in modern society, but shifts the author's
> focus from automobiles (Crash and Concrete Island), to artificial
> communities ( resorts, gated communities, skyscrapers). Ballard is a
> difficult, and not always enjoyable, but important author.
>
> And anyone with an interest in experimental literature should read The
> Atrocity Exhibition, a book that so appalled people when it appeared
> in the 70's that the entire American print run was pulped before
> distribution. It deals with how the media fractures and alienates. In
> fact, Ballard's main obsession is our technology drives us apart. The
> Atrocity Exhibition is the source of his famous short piece "Why I
> Want to Fuck Ronald Reagan."
>
> On Fri, Jul 25, 2008 at 6:25 PM, Randy Krbechek <randyk@psnw.com> wrote:
>> At 7/25/2008, Sean Shapiro wrote:
>>>Has anyone read JG Ballard's 'Cocaine Nights' or 'Running Wild'?
>>>Would anyone care to suggest that they qualify as noir?
>>
>> Sean -
>>
>> I have not read those titles, but I have read "Concrete Island" and
>> "Crash," both of which I recommend. If not noir, they certainly
>> drink from the cup of nihilism. In one of the titles, the
>> protagonist wakes up after a car crash and is stuck in a highway
>> median from which he can't escape. See this link to Wikipedia, which
>> calls it a "twisted adaptation of Robinson Crusoe."
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concrete_Island
>>
>> Bye.
>> Randy Krbechek
>> Fresno, CA
>>
>>
>
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