this is the voice of re:mote induction.Friday, August 29, 2003
Suddenly the world comes back. With a stench of desolation. It smells like a backed-up toilet in an empty house with broken windows. Out of the corner of his eye Max sees something following him. Is it a dog? A cat? It’s a little man, black as ebony, long body, very short arms and legs, large head, big ugly baby-face. He’s inching along on his belly like a dog that’s been run over.
Her Name Was Lola is the latest novel by Russell Hoban, set for publication in hardback in november. which is a little frustrating. i'm doing my usual, random surfing for extracts of books. i've picked up one or two of hoban's books in the shops out of curiousity, but never actually bought and read any of his work. just one of those things you do, a cover catches your eye, you glance at it, and return it to the shelf.
but i've just read this extract and i am hooked. the ideas that hoban is using here work with things going on in my own head, with ideas i am enjoying in other people's work at the moment. a good extract can be readable as almost a short story in it's own right, and can be a good picture. of course some folk chuck out random extracts for anthologies, and those can often not work, disorientating instead of catching the reader; but that is a tangent.
max is a writer of books for adults and children, a lot like hoban himself. he meets a friend every week, they have food, a few drinks, exchange videos to watch. but on this occasion max seems to have picked up a passenger - a dwarf that clings to his back, a dwarf that no one else can see. as the day goes on he realises that someone has done something to him, and it relates to that CD that was slipped through his letter box.
i don't think i can wait till november, and it is unlikely that i would buy in hard back anyway - for the most part i never do. so it is probably just as well that hoban seems to have an extensive back catalog - i had a look in the bookshop last night, having started reading the extract - i think it is only a matter of time before i am exploring something there.
Her Name Was Lola is the latest novel by Russell Hoban, set for publication in hardback in november. which is a little frustrating. i'm doing my usual, random surfing for extracts of books. i've picked up one or two of hoban's books in the shops out of curiousity, but never actually bought and read any of his work. just one of those things you do, a cover catches your eye, you glance at it, and return it to the shelf.
but i've just read this extract and i am hooked. the ideas that hoban is using here work with things going on in my own head, with ideas i am enjoying in other people's work at the moment. a good extract can be readable as almost a short story in it's own right, and can be a good picture. of course some folk chuck out random extracts for anthologies, and those can often not work, disorientating instead of catching the reader; but that is a tangent.
max is a writer of books for adults and children, a lot like hoban himself. he meets a friend every week, they have food, a few drinks, exchange videos to watch. but on this occasion max seems to have picked up a passenger - a dwarf that clings to his back, a dwarf that no one else can see. as the day goes on he realises that someone has done something to him, and it relates to that CD that was slipped through his letter box.
i don't think i can wait till november, and it is unlikely that i would buy in hard back anyway - for the most part i never do. so it is probably just as well that hoban seems to have an extensive back catalog - i had a look in the bookshop last night, having started reading the extract - i think it is only a matter of time before i am exploring something there.
Comments:
Post a Comment
