Spaceman Blues
by Brian Francis Slattery
In a word: Abysmal.
Only the blessedly short length of this book kept it from my "Abandoned" list, and upon completion, I read the praise on the back cover... and realized I should have done this first.
This book is there compared to Pynchon, and indeed, it has that same flavor: that taste of impending story any page now, never realized, never delivered. Like Pynchon, the prose is florid, and essentially meaningless; like Pynchon, the characters are developed to the point of being lifeless caricatures, the motivations unbelievable, the speech incomprehensible, the personalities unlikable; like Pynchon, this book did not satisfy.
My fault, really. I should have thrown it away at the start of the second chapter, third at the latest. Instead, like a literary colic, it blocked my reading queue, displacing no doubt better books.
This book will be discarded, given away, donated... it will only temporarily take up valuable shelf space in my library. I am immensely glad I did not get this book in hardcover. I would not recommend this book to any, except those few who have read, and enjoyed, Pynchon. For those who like that sort of thing, they'll probably love this book.
But not I.