Freezer Burn - Hardcover

Lansdale, Joe R.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 089296703X ISBN 13: 9780892967032

Verlag: Mysterious Press, 1999

Inhaltsangabe

After a botched holdup, Bill, a not-too-bright bungler who has been living with his dead mother in order to collect her social security checks, hides out in a traveling freak show populated by a bizarre assortment of bearded ladies, hermaphrodites, dogmen, and a mysterious frozen man, and a mysterious frozen man

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

JOE R. LANSDALE has written over 200 short stories and over a dozen novels in the suspense, horror, and Western genres. He has also edited several anthologies of dark suspense and Western fiction. He has received the British Fantasy Award, the American Mystery Award, and five Bram Stoker Awards from the Horror Writers of America. He lives in East Texas with his wife, son, daughter, and German shepherd.

Rezensionen

While not dumber than a fence post, Bill Roberts is not noticeably smarter either. When his mother dies abruptly, Bill douses her remains with cologne, swathes the whole in plastic bags, and hopes that he can continue to cash her social security checks. His next brainstorm involves recruiting two buddies to rob a fireworks stand. During the holdup and its aftermath, the storeowner is shot, one of the accomplices gets a Roman candle lodged in his brain, and the other is bitten to death by water moccasins. Bill ends up as part of a traveling freak show, where he gets acquainted with a pair of African American Siamese twins, the Dog Man, and the Ice Man, a shadowy presence and the show's star attraction. This menagerie is presided over by a benevolent beardless Santa Claus whose curvaceous wife uses her manifold charms to persuade Bill that they ought to murder her husband. The irrepressible Lansdale (Rumble Tumble) continues to amuse and astonish with his outrageous storytelling. Definitely not for the squeamish, but highly recommended for those who enjoy the worm in their mezcal.ABob Lunn, Kansas City P.L., MO
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Professional loser Bill Roberts's mother has died, and if he buries her he'll lose her pension checks, which he's also afraid to cash. Out of money and food, he joins two idiot friends and concocts a robbery of a neighboring firecracker stand. They botch the job and flee into the swamps, where Bill escapes, his face so swollen with mosquito bites that John Frost, manager of a traveling carnival and freak show, takes him in. Frost is married to the gorgeous, blonde Gidget, a virtual sex-machine and the most desirable woman Bill has ever seen. Bill is soon immersed in a world of freaks, where he makes friends with Conrad the Wonder Dog and U.S. Grant, the bearded lady, and quickly becomes embroiled with Gidget in a Double Indemnity-style plot to kill Frost and take over the business. Lansdale outdoes himself in rendering sophomoric sexual fantasy and graphic, stomach-turning passages of lurid behavior. There's also an inordinate amount of concern with penile size, bouncing breasts and tiny jeans shorts. As protagonist, Bill is not as much a hero as victim of circumstance, a man who "everywhere he turned is socked by the mallet of stupidity." But at the story's climax, Lansdale reveals Bill to be a true sucker, and unfortunately, readers may not be sympathetic to or appreciative of his folly. The details of East Texas swamps and forests seem on target, although the humor often misfires with overloaded similes and strained attempts to be outrageous. Still, this a page-turner suitable for bus or beach and for anyone with a predilection for tacky raunchiness and a yen for what teenagers call "gross-outs." (Sept.) FYI: Lansdale is the winner of the British Fantasy Award, the American Horror Award and five Bram Stoker Awards from the Horror Writers of America. He has written or edited 31 books, including 16 novels.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

"A terrifically gifted storyteller."

The thing that Bill Roberts misses most about his recently defunct mom is her signature. Social security checksseven of themare piling up, and Bill doesn't see himself as much of a forger. Nor as much of a wage-earner in any conventional sense of the term, which is why a heist of the fireworks stand across the road seems a viable idea. But Bill isn't much of an armed robber either, and the attempted hold-up swiftly becomes a disaster. Bill flees, a step ahead of the East Texas law. For one of the few times in his misbegotten life he gets luckyenough to lose his pursuers in a friendly swamp. Safe though exhausted, he falls asleep, waking to find himself among outtakes from The Origin of Species. Actually, he's in the midst of a low-rent traveling freak show, owned and operated by warmhearted John Frost, who doesn't deserve what is soon to happen to himhaving to do with his marriage to a ruthless, conniving bimbo, her moral sense as underdeveloped as her bosom isn't. Frost, kindness itself to his misfit collection (the dogman, the bearded lady, the pumpkin head, and the Siamese twins among others), is good to Bill, too, taking him in and giving him a job. In gratitude, Bill allows himself to be seduced by the concupiscent Mrs. Frost. Eventually, he joins her in the kind of conspiracy dear to the hearts of noirists late and soon, and if you know your James M. Cain at all, you'll guess how badly it turns out. Lansdale shelves his funny sleuths Hap and Leonard (Rumble Tumble, 1998, etc.) for the sake of this depressing slog through grotesquerie. Lets hope it's just a detour. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Mysterious Press
• Erscheinungsdatum: 1999
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 089296703X
• ISBN 13: 9780892967032
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 256
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar