That was kind of mess... i'm not even sure what the book was about or even how it ended... did they find Manuel or not? Or was there ever a Manuel to begin with? You gotta spell it out for me sometimes... i like nice neat packages ( )

A surreal kaleidoscope of moments woven into a story of apocalyptic intrigue. Stattery's freshman novel manages to take a patchwork of highly surreal story elements and narrate the end of the world, love lost, longing and betrayal.

The single thread that ties this story together is the search for Manuel Rodrigo de Guzmán González. The searches by both his love lorn partner Wendell Apogee, and the crafty detectives Salmon and Trout bring along with them a cavalcade of unique and interesting characters, including the four green indestructible horsemen acting as the harbingers of the apocalypse.

I would not describe this book so much as science fiction as future fiction. The main element within being the potential state of the social mechanisms of the world rather than science that enables it. It is much like a Doctorow book in this fashion, as well as in its fast and intensely paced story. Though I dare say it is much more psychedelically infused than Doctorow's works. ( )

Manuel Rodrigo de Guzmán González disappears, his apartment is consumed by an explosion, and most of the city mourns as though he's dead. The police aren't convinced, and after they question Wendell Apogee, Wendell decides to find out for himself. He doesn't foresee the madhouse things he then proceeds to do—asking questions during a cockfight that gets raided, finding an apocalyptic cult based on valid scientific evidence, going to an underground city in which the best bar is a train car hung from a cavern ceiling. He is changed forever. When aliens come for him wielding weapons from Manuel's apartment, Wendell has to shake up his ordinary life and become someone able to fight such seemingly unstoppable foes. And, wouldn't you know it, the aliens are just forerunners of something bigger and far more devastating than anyone suspected—anyone, that is, except a few who stumbled on certain evidence and created an apocalyptic cult. Spaceman Blues is a mad ride related by a pulp sensibility filtered through the nonstop freneticism of New York's subcultures, real and imagined.

Didn't like it much as I recall. ( )

http://books.kenficara.com/2008/03/sp... ( )