--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Ron Clinton" <clinton65@...> wrote:
>
> While I suspect that was more hyperbole than anything else, I do believe he
> ultimately turned out to be on the mark with that comment. His older books
> typically have a lean and mean, dark and cloying atmosphere of desperation
> akin to Goodis, while his newer books (TWISTED CITY, LIGHTS OUT, THE
> FOLLOWER and PANIC ATTACK) seem to me to be more thriller than noir. Still
> eminently readable and tense, but their fuller, more polished narratives are
> notably less dark and desperate than their predecessors.
>
To me, Panic Attack is brutally bleak. The thriller element interested me far less than the nasty people whose layers Jason peels away, methodically. If you wanted your average prosperous American family in focus, well, there it is. By far his most ambitious book. It will probably be read as a thriller, but that is not mainly what it is, in my opinion. Some of the writing reminded me of Sinclair Lewis, and I mean this as high praise.
Best,
mrt
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