The wreck that really begins the novel is also what ends it. Long
past the settling of steel and rubber, the bodies and brains of
the travelers are beaten and twisted by hate, lust, booze and the
sick heat of the Southern California desert wasteland.
This story is brutal in its realism. No fairy-tale romance or overly
convoluted plots needed. It's not ironic or kitschy; it's certainly
not begging to be loved.
"Biting!"
Kenneth Anger, filmmaker, author
"A dark, powerful, work that knocks you out of your socks.
CRAZY STREAK pops our nightmares like boils and sucks our dreaded
desires to the surface. John Gilmore's teenybopper heroine who
is a pedophile's calendar girl, leaves Lolita in the star dust of
a skyrocket ride few would dare to take. This book blows the lid off the mediocrity passing as today's
so-called literature." ~ Nick Zedd, author of Totem of the Depraved,
and From Entropy to Ecstasy.
Acclaimed internationally for his literary fiction, his hard-boiled
true crime books and Hollywood memoirs, John Gilmore has a following
that spans the globe from Hong Kong to Hollywood.
He is the author of:
· SEVERED: The True Story of the Black Dahlia Murder
·
LIVE FAST-DIE YOUNG: Remembering the Short Life of James Dean
·
MANSON: The Unholy Trail of Charlie and the Family
·
LAID BARE: A Memoir of Wrecked Lives and the Hollywood Death Trip
·
FETISH BLONDE
·
COLD-BLOODED: The Saga of Charles Schmid
·
L.A. DESPAIR: A Landscape of Crimes and Bad Times
·
INSIDE MARILYN MONROE
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"CRAZY STREAK paints a crumbling American dream warped with individual
turmoil and dangerous sexual obsession. Gilmore's provoking characters, sans
a sense of retribution, populate this decaying, throw-away California
desert town set against High Sierras where his protagonist breaks from
his suffocation as in a holy act of self-destruction, rising lawlessly
above a conscience -- or retribution. A tragic story overflowing with
violence and intense, graphic, illegal sex fused with criminal indulgence. Here
is a desperate and relentless people in a relentless novel bound to shatter
long-held sacred literary traditions." ~ Lawrence Grobel, author of Conversations
with Brando; The Hustons; Conversations with Capote; Talking with Michener and other books.
Grobel was a celebrity interviewer for Playboy magazine for many years.
CRAZY STEAK review by Laurel Johnson
John Gilmore has been recognized for decades for his unsettling exposes and noir prose. One critic dubbed him "the literary Hannibal
Lecter."
For certain, Gilmore sets his scenes masterfully while zeroing in on human lusts and frailties. His work is often shocking but always well written. Characters are so sharply drawn we walk in their skins.
Bobby McGee is fresh out of the Army, hoping for a new start away from his
dreary hometown in the California desert. The father who terrorized him in his
boyhood is now an incontinent vegetable, cared for at home by Bobby's mother. His
mother is still young and attractive, plotting her escape from suffocating
circumstances. Bobby's brother, Woody, strung out on drugs and alcohol, is often
unpredictable and dangerous. The woman who loves Bobby is now fat, hooked up unofficially
with his best friend, Clyde, the Mayor's son. His first day back, a car wreck throws
Bobby together with Jo, a seductive 13-year-old nymphet.
Bobby's friends all know he's always had a crazy streak, but his sexual obsession for Jo is out of character for him. After the accident one friend is dead and
another nearly so, but Bobby's life revolves around his insatiable lust for Jo.
And Jo may not be the innocent child she seems to be at first. Law enforcement
officers investigating the accident are determined to protect Clyde. Bribery
escalates to incest, and then murder. And as a backdrop Gilmore drags readers into the
heat, dust, and misery of small town life. As one character tells Bobby, "People are
all sons a bitches when you peel the hide off."
John Gilmore is a VERY good writer. His characters and subjects may be dark, but his prose is exceptional.
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