Spaceman Blues: A Love Song

We sometimes go about things the wrong way; we regret the lover we tired of, and then when they were absent realized that the quiet power of their presence was what we thrived on; we 'discover' a writer's latest work and maddeningly slap palm to forehead for not having read the author's previous works.

So, this is the second book by Slattery I've read, though it was his first.

"Spaceman Blues" contains more of the verve, the jazz, groove infused prose evident in his latest book, "Liberation" (more on that in another review).

The publisher described this book as a “literary retro-pulp science-fiction–mystery–superhero novel.” And I guess that's the best way to describe it. A story about a Messiah, of sorts, that goes missing; his show more lover's quest to find him; the secret dazzling places in New York City (from cock-fighting arenas to vast subterranean enclaves); and an alien invasion thrown in for good measure.

Slattery pays tribute to SF tropes, but more importantly carves a loving portrait of the beautiful ethnic multiplicity of NYC.

Slattery is one of my favorite new writers, his prose is a joy to encounter... show less

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 show more 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. show less

I had trouble making it through this book, mainly due to the writing style. In some ways, the writing style was almost conversational, which isn’t a bad thing. The problem was, it was like listening to somebody who rambles about random things and takes forever to get to the point. Some characteristics that I would normally like in a book, such as descriptiveness, backstories, and extra details, were a chore to get through in this book because of my difficulty with the writing style. The paragraphs were often long and rambling, a page or more in length, describing something in a random and often incoherent fashion. Sometimes I would lose interest partway through the paragraph and then forget which character or place was being described show more by the time I made it to the end.

I kept spacing out while reading, which forced me to go back and re-read sections just to figure out what was being described for fear it might be important to understanding the story. In fact, my reading behavior with this book was very similar to my behavior when I’m reading one of my less-interesting college textbooks. I frequently had to skim back through things I had already read, and I sometimes resorted to reading out loud just to force myself to stay focused on the words and keep my mind from wandering so I could make forward progress.

The characters were interesting, and many of them had interesting backstories. The rather odd thing is that we were often given their future stories too. Sometimes something would happen to a character during the current timeline of the story, or the character would make a certain decision, and then the author would go on to describe the consequences of that event well into the future. To some degree, I found that interesting. It gave me a chance to learn about far-reaching consequences that wouldn’t have made it into the story otherwise because they would have been outside the time frame of the story. On the other hand, it also reduced suspense because you knew whether a character lived or died. Sometimes it even revealed how things would turn out by the end of the book.

When the book focused on the main story and events made forward progress, I found myself getting caught up in the story. I looked forward to seeing what would happen next, which is what kept me from giving up on the book altogether. There was a good story in there; it just kind of got lost in what felt to me like rambling chaos. However, the ending was not at all satisfying. All of the main questions were answered, but nothing was really resolved. In fact, things were in much worse shape by the end of the book than they were in the beginning. Maybe the plan was to write a sequel, or maybe the author just likes to leave things open-ended, but I was hoping for a more satisfying conclusion to reward my perseverance with the book.

The average rating seems pretty high for this book, so I feel like I must have missed something or else I wasn’t in the right frame of mind for it. But I think mostly the writing style just didn’t work for me. show less

Love it ... odd, strange, off-the-wall version of ENDoftheWorld
cover/back-cover reviews mention "jazz" prose, and that really does capture the writing style.

Hard to describe; hard to forget; HIGHLY recommended!

Fun little hard-boiled mystery sci-fi yarn about life and an alien apocalypse. There are sublime moments of elevated writing in here. Will definitely read his next.

rambling and aimless most of the time. the descriptive punch took forever to get to and would often lead to my own mind wandering off and even forgetting who was “thinking” or speaking. i wasn’t even sure who he was writing about in certain places because of the way pronouns were used.

i certainly do not enjoy the writing style but some things about the story and characters are keeping me going. little bits and pieces, glimpses of something more, something that might not be what we expect, something surreal even. i’m hoping to find out that the out-of-focus passages in this book are on purpose and are supposed to reflect some inner plight of the protagonist(s) rather than just poor writing style.

...Nope.

I cared for none of the show more characters (when i knew which one was being written about) and saw no point in the story. Wendell the protagonist becomes some sort of superhero who is able to take on alien badasses and calls himself Captain Spaceman. Somehow. We're never sure how, just that he trained with the "Ciphers." haven't a clue. Never will. Not horrible by a long shot but not my cup of tea. show less

The Apocalypse has a broken heart.