Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Richard Price is one of contemporary America's greatest, 25 Nov 2004
I feel that Richard Price should be considered among the great modern American writers. He seems to be underrated, perhaps because his books tend to be (wrongly) stuck in genre sections of bookshops. He should be on the list with John Irving and Tom Wolfe. He has the ability to bridge the gap between entertainment and profound art. It's exciting and enjoyable reading his work, but you also feel good doing it.Clockers is probably his overall finest book, alternating from two characters points of view throughout the book. It's moving, scary, exciting and profound and gives more real detail than any contenders writing about street life. The best thing I can say about Richard Price, which is something you find all too rarely these days...He's an excellent storyteller and that's all you need to know. Just buy it.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Utterly brilliant, 12 April 1998
By A Customer
I normally read the likes of Dale Brown, Tom Clancy, Clive Cussler and so on; this was something totally different. It was superb and highly engrossing; Richard Price has obviously done his research well. I loved the movie, but the book is much better. The main difference here is that Rocco Klein, the hardworking hassled cop is the good guy and Strike is the protagonist. As the mystery unfolds as to why Victor Dunham confessed to a drug-related murder the cop thinks Strike committed, the ending will surprise you no end. Well done Richard Price; this is a classic book by anyone`s standards.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Literary Forebear of 'The Wire', 27 Feb 2009
'Clockers' is an unrelentingly bleak novel, set in the Projects of Dempsey, New Jersey, at the height of a crack cocaine epidemic. Bleak, but after a slow beginning, this novel makes for compulsive reading.
I struggled at first to find my way in; set in the late eighties, 'Clockers' is slightly dated now, there is a lot of colloquial language and its characters have few redeeming qualities, making for an uneasy read. If I hadn't been watching 'The Wire' around the same time as reading this, I would have probably failed to understand what was happening in the opening hundred pages. There are large amounts of detail about the way drug deals are handled, and how the various police departments interact with the disenfranchised youths selling the drugs. 'The Wire' owes a huge amount to this book, and fans of the series will find much to like here.
Once past the first section, and the fatal shooting around which the rest of the novel hinges, 'Clockers' really takes off. Price has a very descriptive way of writing; no detail remains unanalysed, his characters are full bodied and his two protagonists (a dealer, and a cop) are very well drawn. The reader is pulled into their world and is forced to sympathise with both, despite them being fairly unlikeable characters. The sense of deprivation, despair and the impossibility of escape in both walks of life is acutely assessed.
'Clockers' is no ordinary thriller; the reader is asked to make an emotional and cerebral investment that is not required for your average crime novel, but the book is all the better for it. For me, 'Clockers' drops a star because of its slow beginning, which almost led me to put it down unfinished, but if you can push past that, and care about plot and characterisation, then this is a must read.
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