Kevin Burton Smith:
>
> Or, like, read and learn. No matter what someone
writes, someone will
> miss it. Where would it stop? Street maps for people
who don't live
> in the city the story is set? A dictionary/glossary
at the back for
> big words? Annotations and footnotes?
Kevin, The books George Pelecanos is writing are not set in
his present. They are hard boiled, but they are also
historical novels . Books in George McDonald Fraser's
Flashman series have copious footnotes which are explained in
the back of the book grouped by chapter. You can look up a
footnote immediately, interrupting the flow, read them at the
end of a chapter as I do, or complertely ignore them. I was
given a separate book that explains references in Patrick
O'Brian's Aubrey-Maturin books. You can choose similar
options.
Sure, my suggestion was somewhat facetious, but some people
reading George's books might find something similar useful.
As I read more of the books I have become used to them, and,
as I wrote, I started to miss this layering of information
which may be only tangential to the plot. I have been able to
work out some slang that was not familiar to me from the
context I now ignore or get the sense of the music that I
don't know, but I'm sure I am no getting the whole effect
George intended.
I have read many books, science fiction especially, that have
pages of dialogue only to explain concepts or devices that
will in the plot. George's books are stronger becaused he
doesn't have long passages that do something similar. If you
read his books you can not just be passive. Len Bias died
sixteen years ago. Many people reading Sweet Forever will
have no knowledge of him. Though his death and the cause of
it resonates throughout the book, though it is never
explicitly mentioned. I think this makes the book stronger,
yet anybody who doesn't know these details or at least
bothers to discover them is going to miss much of the book's
impact. Mark . .
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 12 Dec 2001 EST