- Paperback: 188 pages
- Publisher: Future Fiction London (1 Oct 2009)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0578021161
- ISBN-13: 978-0578021164
- Product Dimensions: 22.6 x 15.2 x 1.8 cm
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 2,408,910 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Balzac of the Badlands is neo-noir at its neo-ist. Balzac, Homo Sapiens Sapiens Jones, the Mermaid, Kurdish militants, Irish gangs, and English firms-- what do they have to do with a missing woman? Set in North London, the novel investigates friendship and loss, the shifting planes of past, present, and future, looks into how each of us manipulate time and space through memory and art, and asks the question-- are we all in possession of unearthly powers?
About the Author
Steve Finbow's fiction and non-fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies, journals, and on literary websites. In the late 1980's, he worked for the poet Allen Ginsberg. He is an Extraordinary Senior Lecturer at North-West University, South Africa. He lives in Tokyo.
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A Literary Thriller
16 Dec 2009
If there was a bookshelf in your local bookstore labeled "literary thrillers," a few copies of Balzac of the Badlands would reside there. Somehow art-for-art's-sake and a plot-driven page-turner at the same time, Steve Finbow's debut novel brings together elements that do not usually share the same page: postmodern prose, a gripping mystery plot, love scenes where you can feel every stubble and touch, gangs, militants, detectives, drug smugglers, human smugglers, you name it, it's all in there.
Balthazar Zachariah, in search of a client's missing daughter, brings readers on a Ulysses-style tour across North London, through parks and pubs crowded with sights, sounds and smells. Finbow's protagonist, no henpecked, cuckolded and timid Leopold Bloom, is sophisticated, suave, has a way with words as well as ladies, and has the strange ability to make dogs go crazy upon meeting their gaze. His friend the Mermaid has psychic powers that allow her to converse with people inside paintings and photographs; this ability of hers helps Balthazar get closer and closer to the bottom of an ever-thickening, unfathomable plot full of twists and turns.
You must read the book for yourself---no mere summary of plot or ten-sentence excerpts will do the book justice. The traditional genres of literary or mainstream converge here, and gives us aspiring writers and avid readers hope---that a beautifully written book of prose can at the same time be plot-driven and marketable in content.
Balthazar Zachariah, in search of a client's missing daughter, brings readers on a Ulysses-style tour across North London, through parks and pubs crowded with sights, sounds and smells. Finbow's protagonist, no henpecked, cuckolded and timid Leopold Bloom, is sophisticated, suave, has a way with words as well as ladies, and has the strange ability to make dogs go crazy upon meeting their gaze. His friend the Mermaid has psychic powers that allow her to converse with people inside paintings and photographs; this ability of hers helps Balthazar get closer and closer to the bottom of an ever-thickening, unfathomable plot full of twists and turns.
You must read the book for yourself---no mere summary of plot or ten-sentence excerpts will do the book justice. The traditional genres of literary or mainstream converge here, and gives us aspiring writers and avid readers hope---that a beautifully written book of prose can at the same time be plot-driven and marketable in content.
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