- Hardcover: 224 pages
- Publisher: Viking; Advance Copy edition (6 Nov 1997)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 067087549X
- ISBN-13: 978-0670875498
- Product Dimensions: 21.1 x 13 x 2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,291,386 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Product Description
Sitting on Death Row, the Speed Queen tells how mainlining speed turned into dealing, how dealing turned into robbery, and robbery turned into mass murder. Set against an American landscape of fast-food joints and endless highways, this comic tale tells of lives in uncontrollable overdrive.
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First Sentence
I hope you don't mind but I wrote this first part out, so I'll just read it now and get it over with. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
I hope you don't mind but I wrote this first part out, so I'll just read it now and get it over with. Read the first page
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Marjorie Standiford awaits her death; mere hours away she is from it, yet she seems at peace, chattering away about her life & the impending termination of it tonight. She is on death row, her execution is tonight & this is her story, dictated to us on a tape recorder, put onto paper for us to read, to put right the wrongs claimed in a book by her ex lover, Natalie.
This fictional but 'but it seems so real!' book is about young Marjorie, a mother, wife & daughter being executed for intentionally causing the deaths of innocent Sonic Burger workers.
During time in imprisonment for drug charges, Marjorie meets Natalie, an attractive, malicious bi-sexual female. Alone & missing her young son & husband, Marjorie finds comfort in Natalie... and more. A web of lies spun by Natalie convinces Marjorie that her new found friend is alone & need of help and so allows her to move in with herself and her family on their release... A drug deal gone wrong after a raid starts a chain of events that threatens Marjories relationship with Natalie, her son & her husband...
Stewart O'nan has created a strange book; one that I am unable to compare to another; he's managed to get inside the head of a serial killer & make us become quite fond of the amphetamine craving girl. The book does not move slowly, yet at a pace where one feels comfortable reading it. Hard to put down & strangely enjoyable; one would almost wish that Natalie had written a book too to see the other side of the story.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I cannot rate this book highly enough. The story is told in response to questions from Steven King by a woman on death row. The fall into personal destruction is beautifully laid out.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
30 reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful
driving the fast lane
23 Mar 2003
Format:Paperback
Speed Queen is the exciting story of Marjorie, a death-row inmate from Oklahoma who is waiting to be executed. The woman reflects on her troubled drug-fueled life, and gives the reader a detailed description of her childhood, how she met her friends and came in contact with drugs before she ultimately reports about the crimes they have committed, and which are the reason why she has been sentenced.
Marjorie bluntly reveals the most intimate secrets of her love triangle, -between her, her girlfriend Natalie and her husband Lamont-, gives deep insight in what it is to be to be married to a car loving drug dealer, having a baby and living a life on speed.
The author's unique style of writing is a hallmark of this novel: song names, movies, books, drugs, local drive-thru restaurants and their menues - when reading this story the reader comes across numerous proper names, most of them only Stephen King fans, local citizens, junkies and car addicts have heard of. However, this does not affect the story negatively. The every-day language matches the story perfectly, yet it does not get too coloquial and after a few pages one quickly gets familiar with O'Nan's style and is introduced to the realistic world of Marjorie that is exciting, beautiful, strange and brutal at the same time.
Marjorie bluntly reveals the most intimate secrets of her love triangle, -between her, her girlfriend Natalie and her husband Lamont-, gives deep insight in what it is to be to be married to a car loving drug dealer, having a baby and living a life on speed.
The author's unique style of writing is a hallmark of this novel: song names, movies, books, drugs, local drive-thru restaurants and their menues - when reading this story the reader comes across numerous proper names, most of them only Stephen King fans, local citizens, junkies and car addicts have heard of. However, this does not affect the story negatively. The every-day language matches the story perfectly, yet it does not get too coloquial and after a few pages one quickly gets familiar with O'Nan's style and is introduced to the realistic world of Marjorie that is exciting, beautiful, strange and brutal at the same time.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
dear stephen king: a few unnecessary words-amen
26 April 2010
Format:Paperback
any book you can't put down-literally can't put it down, sticking like tar paper-is a good one, all literary merit aside. all o'nan i've read has literary merit, and this one's no different, but what gets you is the story, the rawness, the realness, the poignancy, the drawing you in, the resonation afterwards. the speed queen does all this and your heart palpitates with hers and it's real and it's horrific yet you're detached, like marjorie, like you can be sometimes in life. you feel her impending doom in your bowels the whole time. it's mainlining literature and feels like flying downhill, on fire, and not caring at all about the crash because it just feels too good.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
DARK AND DIRTY, GREAT READING
5 April 2009
Format:Paperback
THE SPEED QUEEN
I am a total fan of Stewart O'Nan. If you haven't read him, do. He writes like no one can and writes well. He tells tales out of school in a dark, quirky, funny, sad, most believeable way. He makes you remember his books forever.
We meet Marjorie Standiford who is going to meet her Maker. She is on Death Row in an Oklahoma prison. She is one of the three 'Sonic Killers' and is telling her life story to none other than Stephen King. It is mere hours before her execution. She always, to the end of the book, maintains she is innocent. Is she? Will she receive yet another stay of execution? Is her story true?
Marjorie tells the tale of her childhood, meeting her husband, Lamont, having a child, and meeting her lover, Natalie. All her memories are excellent and full of details, jumping back and forth between past and present, full of suspense and constantly making the reader wonder if she is, in fact, innocent of these horrible murders.
Marjorie is involved in drinking, drugs, and after meeting and marrying Lamont, they get deeply involved in drugs and dealing. They live for cars, drugs, and rock and roll. When they meet up with Natalie things go bad quickly for all of them.
This is a good book. It is not for everyone, it left me feeling squeamish at times. The book reads well and doesn't disappoint. While constantly wondering about Marjorie being innocent of horrid murders, I could not help but like her and root for her. However, at the same time, she is someone scary and unstable enough that you certainly wouldn't want to be involved with her. O'Nan creates such vivid characters who, good or bad or just plain wicked, you cannot help liking.
Highly recommend this book, although it's not for everyone due to the content and situations.
Thank you!
Pam
I am a total fan of Stewart O'Nan. If you haven't read him, do. He writes like no one can and writes well. He tells tales out of school in a dark, quirky, funny, sad, most believeable way. He makes you remember his books forever.
We meet Marjorie Standiford who is going to meet her Maker. She is on Death Row in an Oklahoma prison. She is one of the three 'Sonic Killers' and is telling her life story to none other than Stephen King. It is mere hours before her execution. She always, to the end of the book, maintains she is innocent. Is she? Will she receive yet another stay of execution? Is her story true?
Marjorie tells the tale of her childhood, meeting her husband, Lamont, having a child, and meeting her lover, Natalie. All her memories are excellent and full of details, jumping back and forth between past and present, full of suspense and constantly making the reader wonder if she is, in fact, innocent of these horrible murders.
Marjorie is involved in drinking, drugs, and after meeting and marrying Lamont, they get deeply involved in drugs and dealing. They live for cars, drugs, and rock and roll. When they meet up with Natalie things go bad quickly for all of them.
This is a good book. It is not for everyone, it left me feeling squeamish at times. The book reads well and doesn't disappoint. While constantly wondering about Marjorie being innocent of horrid murders, I could not help but like her and root for her. However, at the same time, she is someone scary and unstable enough that you certainly wouldn't want to be involved with her. O'Nan creates such vivid characters who, good or bad or just plain wicked, you cannot help liking.
Highly recommend this book, although it's not for everyone due to the content and situations.
Thank you!
Pam
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