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A review by kymme
The Four Fingers of Death by Rick Moody
3.0
Parts of this book are set in Tucson (re-named Rio Blanco here), and the Tucson descriptions are hauntingly delightful for a homesick displaced Tucsonan.
The beginning of this book, the set-up to the "real story," is so funny I got weird looks for laughing on a plane as I read it.
The middle is a fantastic sci-fi book in itself, set in space/on Mars. A thousand times better than the last Mars book I [tried to] read (Green Mars? Red Mars? One of those.)
The final section is. um. really really really really really really odd. But set it Tucson! So it's fun in some senses, and there are quite compelling sections and characters, but this part is much slower going, with new characters that take a very long time to understand/like, fairly strong but also rather annoying voices (one character goes on stream-of-consciousness rants for pages on end with every other word being f*ck, for example) and a jumpy structure... and there is super strange disgusting sex stuff with an animated-but-dead dismembered arm (if that makes no sense, well...), and some annoying meta-bits where something or someone gets introduced, then developed solely and explicitly for the reason that if something/someone is going to be killed, they need to be fleshed out first--so that got a little old, and it felt there as if Moody were being paid by the word.
I would wish for an entirely different spin on the last 200 pages or so, and it could have been a 5 start kind of delightful book. The first two sections are awesome, and that last section is simply not. I'm still grateful to have read it, though, for the Tucson moments only people who actually live in Tucson are likely to notice/pay attention to, such as: city lights from the foothills, the Happiness is Submission to God building, the Buffet (not mentioned by name but there nonetheless), and the way shorts seems like normal clothing there all year around. The line about that was brilliant. [One thing: For some reason Moody spells Mount Lemmon with one m. Not sure if that's a mistake on his part or an editor's part, but I think it's neither, and rather part of the "this isn't realllllly Tucson" signposts.]
Despite that final section being, did I mention, weird?!, it has powerful moments. I'm talking about lines like this one:
"Truths are lubricated and personal things, and there is an adherent for every truth under the sun" (509). Lines like that actually make me want to read the book again.
The beginning of this book, the set-up to the "real story," is so funny I got weird looks for laughing on a plane as I read it.
The middle is a fantastic sci-fi book in itself, set in space/on Mars. A thousand times better than the last Mars book I [tried to] read (Green Mars? Red Mars? One of those.)
The final section is. um. really really really really really really odd. But set it Tucson! So it's fun in some senses, and there are quite compelling sections and characters, but this part is much slower going, with new characters that take a very long time to understand/like, fairly strong but also rather annoying voices (one character goes on stream-of-consciousness rants for pages on end with every other word being f*ck, for example) and a jumpy structure... and there is super strange disgusting sex stuff with an animated-but-dead dismembered arm (if that makes no sense, well...), and some annoying meta-bits where something or someone gets introduced, then developed solely and explicitly for the reason that if something/someone is going to be killed, they need to be fleshed out first--so that got a little old, and it felt there as if Moody were being paid by the word.
I would wish for an entirely different spin on the last 200 pages or so, and it could have been a 5 start kind of delightful book. The first two sections are awesome, and that last section is simply not. I'm still grateful to have read it, though, for the Tucson moments only people who actually live in Tucson are likely to notice/pay attention to, such as: city lights from the foothills, the Happiness is Submission to God building, the Buffet (not mentioned by name but there nonetheless), and the way shorts seems like normal clothing there all year around. The line about that was brilliant. [One thing: For some reason Moody spells Mount Lemmon with one m. Not sure if that's a mistake on his part or an editor's part, but I think it's neither, and rather part of the "this isn't realllllly Tucson" signposts.]
Despite that final section being, did I mention, weird?!, it has powerful moments. I'm talking about lines like this one:
"Truths are lubricated and personal things, and there is an adherent for every truth under the sun" (509). Lines like that actually make me want to read the book again.