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A review by james_bowers
Drive: A Novel by James Sallis
2.0
Let's start with what this book does well. Sallis does a great job of building a 'noir' atmosphere in his writing, which is accompanied on many occasions by moments of truly poetic turn of phrase. In isolation, there are elements of his craft which I certainly admire.
However, problems arise when Sallis is tasked with weaving those moments together. Personally, I found the 'jumpy' structural nature of the book to be more jarring than enthralling. By the end, I did have a good grasp of what was going on, but I wouldn't go as far as to say that I enjoyed the experience. That word, 'enjoyment', is the key here. In theory, this book's premise has all the pieces to suggest it'd make for a great story, but in practice not much of that potential was realized.
At no point did I feel any sort of connection to the characters. The main protagonist has plenty of backstory but not enough personality for me to care. His various acquaintances appear too fleetingly to build any sort of emotional connection to either, and as for the antagonists - they're arguably even worse. The two 'big baddies' are dealt with abruptly, with minimal build-up and practically zero pay-off. If I was being charitable, I might say that this is a side-effect of the blunt, noir narrative style. But, surely a well-executed noir novel would manage to balance its dark simplicity with actual narrative substance. That, unfortunately, is something which I feel 'Drive' truly lacks.
As the final nail in the coffin, our protagonist is seen driving off into the sunset in a "nineties Datsun". Yet, the last Datsun-badged car (before the brand's ill-fated 2010s revival) rolled off production lines in 1986. Surely cars are the one thing this book shouldn't be getting wrong...
However, problems arise when Sallis is tasked with weaving those moments together. Personally, I found the 'jumpy' structural nature of the book to be more jarring than enthralling. By the end, I did have a good grasp of what was going on, but I wouldn't go as far as to say that I enjoyed the experience. That word, 'enjoyment', is the key here. In theory, this book's premise has all the pieces to suggest it'd make for a great story, but in practice not much of that potential was realized.
At no point did I feel any sort of connection to the characters. The main protagonist has plenty of backstory but not enough personality for me to care. His various acquaintances appear too fleetingly to build any sort of emotional connection to either, and as for the antagonists - they're arguably even worse. The two 'big baddies' are dealt with abruptly, with minimal build-up and practically zero pay-off. If I was being charitable, I might say that this is a side-effect of the blunt, noir narrative style. But, surely a well-executed noir novel would manage to balance its dark simplicity with actual narrative substance. That, unfortunately, is something which I feel 'Drive' truly lacks.
As the final nail in the coffin, our protagonist is seen driving off into the sunset in a "nineties Datsun". Yet, the last Datsun-badged car (before the brand's ill-fated 2010s revival) rolled off production lines in 1986. Surely cars are the one thing this book shouldn't be getting wrong...