Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.
Loading... Gates of Eden (original 1998; edition 1998)by Ethan Coen
Work InformationGates of Eden by Ethan Coen (1998)
None Loading...
Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. The most interesting of these short pieces read like ideas for rejected Coen Brothers' screenplays in miniature. The least interesting tend towards trying too hard (the one with the British secret agents) or not trying hard enough. Some of them (Hector Berlioz, Private Investigator -- where the most original and interesting premise is the title) somehow manage to be both at once. Overall, stick with Ethan Coen's screen-works and avoid this unless you absolutely need to read everything he's written. With this book, Ethan Coen proved himself a true wordsmith. His prose is witty, starkly realistic, and often beautiful. His plots, on the other hand, are quite lacking. This is more a matter of personal taste, but I prefer stories in which something actually happens. Too many of the stories merely stopped after assorted description, rather than providing an actual ending or at least a feeling of purpose to the story (often I was left thinking, "So why did he think that story was worth retelling?" or "Where was he going with that?"). I also got tired of feeling like I was hearing everything secondhand. Even the stories that were not in first person left me feeling like somebody was telling me the story, rather than truly experiencing the events or connecting at all with the characters. I'm glad I read this, but I think I'll stick to Coen films from now on. Damn was this book a lot better when I figured out that it wasn't a novel! That's what I get for not paying close enough attention, although it was an interesting trick to play on my brain. Ethan Coen has that remarkable ability to write in other people's voices in a place and time so specific to them, combining historocity and dramatic character interplay that is so Coen. Some of the stories are semi-autobiographical while others are pure fantasy, but the characters he creates have a tendency toward interesting and ironic. The highlight was a detective story written like an old-time radio drama script, feeling like 1940s New York (door creaks, foot steps). I read some of it alound just for fun, and the script was so genuine that it was easy to find those old movie voices coming through. Extremely enjoyable. no reviews | add a review
Belongs to Publisher SeriesGoldmann (44987)
In Gates of Eden, Ethan Coen exhibits on the printed page the striking, twisted, yet devastatingly on-target vision of modern American life familiar from his movies. The world within the world we live in comes alive in fourteen brazenly original tragicomic short stories--from the Midwest mob war that fizzles due to the principals' ineptness to the trials of a deaf private eye with a blind client to a fugitive's heartbreaking explanation for having beheaded his wife, alarming in that it almost makes sense. No library descriptions found. |
Current DiscussionsNonePopular covers
Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813Literature English (North America) American fictionLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
Is this you?Become a LibraryThing Author. |
I can't see how the hard copy could compare to Steve Buscemi, John Goodman, John Turturro, Liev Shrieber, Ben Stiller and a few others reading these. These guys totally owned each story.
Damn. All kinds of fun. ( )