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At times crew members engage in philosophical discussions, where fundamental questions are asked. What does it mean for our planet to be—presumably—the only one to sustain life in this galaxy and galaxies beyond? What does it mean if we’re not the only such life-form? Harvey also brilliantly captures the air of camaraderie these men and women depend upon to survive.
Award-winning film producer, publisher, author, and investigative journalist Roger Rapoport has covered the Patty Hearst story for half a century. He has written for the Chicago Tribune, Wall Street Journal, Miami Herald, Boston Globe, Dallas Morning News, San Jose Mercury News, The Independent (UK) and the San Francisco Chronicle. His magazine articles have been published in Harper’s, The Atlantic, Esquire and Mother Jones.
As with any novel steeped in noir, the narrator’s voice is everything. Does Jack’s voice, as shown here sounding somewhat detached from his surroundings, persuade us of the authenticity of his story? Yes, some of the time, while at other moments he comes across as much too naïve for this crooked line of work.
Nick Harkaway’s new novel, Titanium Noir, continues in this vein. A mash-up of science fiction and hard-boiled detective story, it starts out promisingly enough. Cal Sounder, a “police consultant,” investigates the murder of a Titan, aged 90 but due to advances in technology inhabiting a 30-year-old’s body (and, when alive, standing more than seven feet tall). Cal’s investigation into this “dead nerd” spirals into unforeseen nooks and crannies, with dangerous repercussions.
There are other quiet moments, too, when the Essex Dogs ride on horseback to their next military engagement, bivouac around the campfire at night, and so on. But make no mistake: Essex Dogs is a novel composed of “action prose”— blunt, feverish, staccato language, and, for long stretches, unremitting. If your taste runs to vividly-depicted violence, Dan Jones is your man.
Michael Hanson, phone in hand, stood looking out the window of his second-story office on Montana and Twelfth Street in Santa Monica. It was an inexpensive suite on an expensive street—just one small room and a secretarial station—but it was a prestigious address and that was important to him. Diane, his secretary, went home early because of a childcare emergency. Ordinarily, Michael would have been annoyed, but somehow aiding Diane in her childcare efforts worked to assuage his considerable guilt regarding his daughter.
Klieg lights installed on the roof of the Foreign Ministry building—itself, a bleak ten-story monolith—beamed down on arriving guests. I fell in with a crowd of cigar-puffing apparatchiks and their brawny wives, all of us moving down a herringbone-parquet hallway into a stately ballroom. The mincing waiter led me to a table in the rear, far from the podium and head table, around which the evening’s festivities would revolve.
Despite her fatigue, Hetty was committed to her mission. She was about to board the tram when two German soldiers whisked by, armed with submachine guns. Hetty stopped breathing and let the soldiers pass. It took every bit of fortitude in her 97-pound frame to appear unfazed by their presence. If she collapsed or gasped from lack of air, then all eyes would be on her. She had come too far to lose everything now.