Last Call for the Living

by Peter Farris

[jamiereadthis]

Very interesting premise, very first-novel execution. What I really liked got mired in what was trying too hard and ultimately, it just didn’t click. The characters fell flat for me in a way that made the book seem tame, not something that should happen when violence is roiling like electricity. It was very written, and maybe that’s a nebulous kind of distinction to make, and a personal one, but I’m hypersensitive these days to when the writer keeps interjecting over the freight-train story and doesn’t just get out of the way.

Three stars, possibly, had it not been for the dreams, and also Charlie. By the end I still didn’t know who he was, although the very end: that was right on.

And well, shit. I hate leaving less-than-enthused reviews for Goodreads authors because they’re real people, not a name on a book jacket, and I clicked through to Farris’s website and he’s reading Rick Bass and listening to Patterson Hood. Goddamnit. Four stars now?