Review
‘Rawley has an uncanny knack for making the bizarre beautiful and for capturing the pathos and peculiar dignity of characters who wouldn’t normally command respect. He achieves an emotional and tonal range that’s extremely impressive.’
Christina Patterson, Observer
‘Hollywood… is the setting for these vital, explosive short stories. Rawley’s characters live life on the edge, from True Romance-style, drug-fuelled teenagers to faded Twenties starlets, living alone. Norma Desmond-like, in their decaying mansions. Rawley’s language is lush – he’s an acclaimed poet – and every word is made to count. Essential reading.’
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‘Rawley writes prose with real poetry in it’
Scott Bradfield, Mail on Sunday
Product Description
When a quiet young woman is murdered with awful precision in her quiet, anonymous Hollywood apartment, it comes as no surprise that within a matter of hours her relatives are contacted, a film deal is struck and a screenplay commissioned. For sensitive journeyman writer Samuel Johnson, it is the chance to finally make a mark, to work with successful producer Sol Seagull and contribute, in a small way, to the Hollywood dream.
But in taking the job, Samuel finds himself reluctantly drawn into a twilight world where all the cliches ring true: where vulgar B-move stars spend their afternoon in a haze of tequila... and where the only person who seems to have cared about a plain, overweight office worker is her murderer.
The End of Miss Kind is a lovely, lyrical, noirish Hollywood murder mystery, the best - and last - work from the acclaimed author of Slow Dance on the Fault Line.
"Brutally gorgeous, triumphantly lyrical, and unmistakably brilliant. Donald Rawley makes myth of our contemporary lives."
--Kate Braverman
"Rawley's writing blazes unapologetically fecund and startling, like some kind of bird of paradise from Mars. It is a literary movement in itself."
--Sandra Tsing Loh
"Donald Rawley is the literary equivalent of amyl nitrate. Reading this searing talent may give you a heart attack, but you'll die with a twisted, sated smile of gratitude on your lips."
--Jerry Stahl, author of Permanent Midnight
But in taking the job, Samuel finds himself reluctantly drawn into a twilight world where all the cliches ring true: where vulgar B-move stars spend their afternoon in a haze of tequila... and where the only person who seems to have cared about a plain, overweight office worker is her murderer.
The End of Miss Kind is a lovely, lyrical, noirish Hollywood murder mystery, the best - and last - work from the acclaimed author of Slow Dance on the Fault Line.
"Brutally gorgeous, triumphantly lyrical, and unmistakably brilliant. Donald Rawley makes myth of our contemporary lives."
--Kate Braverman
"Rawley's writing blazes unapologetically fecund and startling, like some kind of bird of paradise from Mars. It is a literary movement in itself."
--Sandra Tsing Loh
"Donald Rawley is the literary equivalent of amyl nitrate. Reading this searing talent may give you a heart attack, but you'll die with a twisted, sated smile of gratitude on your lips."
--Jerry Stahl, author of Permanent Midnight
