Dream Girl
I think — memory is porous — it was the The Duchess who first floated the author’s name in front of me. Might’ve read some other works, don’t recall. Sounds correct to my ear. All about that voyage of discovery and how I gather new material to read.
“It’s more Rod McKuen than William Carlos Williams, but it has a sort of bare-bones charm.” Page 10.
Just out of the prologue, but a good enough start. Post-modern intelligence is a hook.
“The novel had been changed forever by film and television; there was no going back. The question was how to go forward.” Page 103.
Earlier in the novel, there’s a question of whether a man can write from a woman’s perspective, and the novel does poke at that, especially with a real female author writing from a male author’s perspective as the frame for the narrative.
However, as a sub-plot item, how the nature of the novel has changed, with the presence of TV, film, and now, electronic streaming for narrative forms. Side idea, not a major piece, but it is a complex novel.
Halfway through the novel, maybe just a third, I paused and searched for the author’s name, hitting the wiki page and staying away from the author’s site. Drawing from that wiki page, portions are a little self-serving, and I was totally unaware of Tart Noire, a subset of mystery, crime novels with strong female leads, nor, was I aware of the long series with by the author of such. Got introduced to the Stephanie Plum series by a co-worker, but after a single novel, I stayed clear of that series. Not that I didn’t like it, just, I have an image to uphold. More my mistake.
I like strong female leads. Half my clientele fits that term, maybe more.
“Magicians are allowed to safeguard their tricks; why aren’t novelists?” Page 192.
You would think.
Felt like I was more than halfway done before I realized this was going to be a literary murder-mystery crime-thriller. Not sure how many bodies would drop, nor if this merely marked the death of a beloved figure in literature.
I stayed up late to finish the book, means it’s good.
There’s a highly intelligent (Aquarius) author at work, in a really good form, and terminal twist asa the end.
