- Paperback: 240 pages
- Publisher: Flamingo; (Reissue) edition (8 Oct 1992)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0586090185
- ISBN-13: 978-0586090183
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Amazon Bestsellers Rank:
854,807 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2 in Books > Travel & Holiday > Countries & Regions > United States > States > South Dakota
- #23 in Books > Reference > Writing > Genre Fiction > Crime, Thrillers & Mystery
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Product Description
Product Description
In "a vital mix of literary criticism, personality profiles, and imaginary geography" (New Statesman and Society), Williams seeks out the mythical America of the nation's most astute chroniclers--the crime writers--to find Elmore Leonard's Miami, Sara Paretsky's Chicago, and Andrew Vachss' New York, among others.
From the Back Cover
In the summer of ‘89 John Williams donned a baseball cap and took off for the States to search out the mythical America of the crime writers, the nation’s most astute chroniclers – to find James Ellroy’s LA, Elmore Leonard’s sleazy South Beach of Miami, Sara Paretsky’s Chicago. Meeting, among others, George V Higgins in Boston and Leonard in Detroit, partying with James Crumley in Montana and undertaking an unnerving tour of New York’s underbelly with Andrew Vachss, Williams discovers an urban America at least as disturbing and mesmeric as the popular fiction of some of his interviewees and gives us an unforgettable, often hilarious commentary on his own predicament as a penniless traveller living in a string of roachy motels.
“An acute journey, alive with the stark and the surreal”
GQ
“Part travelogue, part interviews, stuffed with anecdotes, critical asides and astute observations, 'Into the Badlands' brings personality and pleasure into the stuffy and sombre world of literary commentary … a refreshingly vital approach”
CITY LIMITS
“I learned a few things. There is vital sociological and moral comment here too”
PATRICIA HIGHSMITH
“An interesting, engaging literary travelogue”
INDEPENDENT
“A vital mixture of literary criticism, personality profiles and imaginary geography”
NEW STATESMAN AND SOCIETY
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
You think you have seen America in countless movies and cop shows, or read about it in novels. You may have seen tourist brochures that show the major attractions and entertainments, a somewhat different view. You may also be a fan of fine literature, of which America can boast many writers. But John Williams is interested in crime, especially American crime. He contends that the crime novel is as valid a form of writing to give an insight into the 'Real America,' which lies beyond both tourist traps and Hollywood (or New York or Chicago) generated entertainment, where ordinary, real Americans live a darker life.
With this in mind, a higher respect for crime fiction and a fascination for the country that produced it, John Williams wanted both to meet some of the greats of the crime-writing genre and see some of the actual locations - The Badlands of this book's title - and find out the truth about the less savoury activities, people and places in this huge land. To do this he travels east to west through the southern states, then back east via the northern route, visiting crime-writers and the cities, crimes and criminals that they write about.
The book largely works because you know you are getting a bird's eye view of the reality, admittedly as filtered through Williams' own interests and obsessions. Some of it makes pretty grim reading - wait till you get to a chapter that forewarns with the title, 'As Cold As it Gets.' You sometimes wish that Mr Williams would lighten up the exposition with something a little less squalid. But this is a country of poor as well as rich, and poor people sometimes, even in a highly developed society, do some pretty awful things, just to get by, on a daily basis, like it's nothing more than going out to fetch milk or bread.
Dark, compelling, depressing even, but also enlightening - the America that even America probably doesn't want other people to see.
With this in mind, a higher respect for crime fiction and a fascination for the country that produced it, John Williams wanted both to meet some of the greats of the crime-writing genre and see some of the actual locations - The Badlands of this book's title - and find out the truth about the less savoury activities, people and places in this huge land. To do this he travels east to west through the southern states, then back east via the northern route, visiting crime-writers and the cities, crimes and criminals that they write about.
The book largely works because you know you are getting a bird's eye view of the reality, admittedly as filtered through Williams' own interests and obsessions. Some of it makes pretty grim reading - wait till you get to a chapter that forewarns with the title, 'As Cold As it Gets.' You sometimes wish that Mr Williams would lighten up the exposition with something a little less squalid. But this is a country of poor as well as rich, and poor people sometimes, even in a highly developed society, do some pretty awful things, just to get by, on a daily basis, like it's nothing more than going out to fetch milk or bread.
Dark, compelling, depressing even, but also enlightening - the America that even America probably doesn't want other people to see.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
3 reviews
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful
A Grand Tour of American Crime (circa 1989)
26 May 2001
Format:Paperback
This unpretentious literary travelogue provides an excellent window into a number of top American crime writers and the (mostly urban) areas they inhabit. Williams' 1989 circuit of the U.S. is a kind of crime fiction grand tour, as he visits thirteen established and up-and-coming authors (only one of whom is female) in ten locations, each of which gets about 20-25 pages or so, as follows:
Miami >> Carl Hiassen (Lucky You, Stormy Weather), James Hall Louisiana >> James Lee Burke New Mexico >> Tony Hillerman Los Angeles >> James Ellroy, Gar Anthony Haywood San Francisco >> Joe Gores (32 Cadillacs) Missoula, MT >> James Crumley (Bordersnakes) Chicago >> Sara Partesky, Eugene Izzi Detroit >> Elmore Leonard (Be Cool, Cuba Libre, Pronto, Pagan Babies, Riding the Rap) Boston >> George V. Higgins New York >> Andrew Vachss
Williams is clearly a believer in detective fiction as social portraiture and commentary, and like myself, he's most interested in what is generally classified under the catchall terms "hard-boiled" or "noir." That is to say, crime novels about the everyday criminal world, as opposed to semi-mythical world of "The Godfather," the serial-killer world of Hannibal Lechter, or the cozy world of crime-solving cats or little old ladies. Williams tends to stay in the cheaper, and thus seedier, parts of the places he visits, and tries to get the writers to show him around, show him their world. In addition to touring the seedy side of America, Williams often takes side-trips of a musical nature--as befits his music journalist career. His contrasting of a (white) cajun fete with a (black) zydeco dance is one of the truly telling parts of his journey. The conversations with the writers are intermittently interesting, although it's interesting to note that many of them came from impoverished backgrounds and came to writing by accident. Another similarity is their rough treatment at the hands of Hollywood. Most of the writers are extremely forthcoming and open with Williams, the most notable exception being Higgins, who comes off as a pompous ass in comparison to the rest of the book's subjects.
Some twelve years after Williams' trip, it's rather amazing to find that 12 of the 13 writers are still going strong, with a string of books to their credit from the intervening years. Indeed some, like Carl Hiassen, James Lee Burke, James Ellroy, and Elmore Leonard have gotten considerably more famous. The one writer who isn't still producing is Eugene Izzi, who was found dead in 1997, hanging from his 14th-story office window in what was ruled a bizarre suicide...
Since writing this book, Williams has gone on to write crime fiction himself, including the 1983-set London novel Faithless, and a collection of stories set in the Cardiff underworld, Five Pubs, Two Bars and a Nightclub.
the dark underbelly
11 Nov 2011
Format:Paperback
Reconfirms everyone's fears of America as a cesspool of crime...at least on the printed pages of crime novels. Interesting cross between a sort of "60 Minutes" like take on various crime writers but interviewing them about their lives in the cities they set their stories in. I found Andrew Vachss's New York to be the closest to his novels esp. his little tour of the streetwalker districts. You do not have to be a fan of any of these writers to get something out of this book. In fact, many of the vignettes turned me onto writers I had never heard of before. A good introduction into both the crime novel genre and the people and places behind these stories.
The Way It Is
18 Sep 2011
Format:Paperback
A great, no-nonsense look at how people actually live while writing crime fiction, heck, while writing anything. This is the book to read while deciding how you're going to finance that writing career.
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