- Hardcover: 295 pages
- Publisher: Knopf; First Edition edition (July 21 1998)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0375401423
- ISBN-13: 978-0375401428
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.2 x 3.3 cm
- Shipping Weight: 635 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,133,587 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
At several points Love Is a Racket is outright offensive in its depiction of Jeffty Kittridge's Hollywood skid-row world. Yet, Jeffty's narrative voice is so compelling, so real, that you want to know how he makes out.
The novel begins with Ty--a heavy working for the local loan shark, Dumas--breaking Jeffty's fingers. The fingers become a symbol of Jeffty's relentless bad luck as he tries and fails time and again to make the $15,000 he owes Dumas. Years ago, the reader discovers, Jeffty had come to Hollywood as an aspiring scriptwriter (a life that Jonathan Ridley lived, ultimately writing episodes of Martin, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and The John Laroquette Show), but he now declares himself a grifter, a gambler, and, gradually, a drunk. Several roads to salvation emerge in Jeffty's nightmare life. At one point, it seems that a day at the races just might erase his debts. His "friend," Nellis, reappears at another moment--a junkie and, strangely, a master of Zen poker who hopes to win Jeffty's money for him. And, finally, Mona, an attractive young homeless woman, keeps showing up until Jeffty realizes that she is his last chance for escape.
Despite its grim subject matter, the book is sexy and often outright funny. ("My good luck was LA's a great place to work. Except for the smog and the gang violence, the brushfires in summer, the rain and floods in the winter, it's great.") Ridley injects bits of Eastern mysticism and icy realism to suggest a deeper truth behind Jeffty's tragicomic façade. While it's not a book for the overly sensitive, it is a masterpiece of noir black comedy that recalls Elmore Leonard's best writing. --Patrick O'Kelley
From Publishers Weekly
Ridley's second novel (after Stray Dogs, 1997) brings panache and a kooky premise to a familiar setting. Jeffty is an African American L.A. grifter whose hustles inevitably fail, whose screenplay everyone deems "beautiful" and whose plot to wring money from old-time movie mogul Moe Steinberg is as quintessentially Hollywood-gothic as a mansion on Mulholland Drive. Jeffty concocts the scam of a lifetime to enact revenge on his bookie, Dumas, whose goon breaks Jeffty's finger. Sadly for him and for us, Dumas proceeds to bump off Jeffty's best chance of making the payback money (and the story's most interesting character): Nellis, a wife-killing junkie who wins fortunes by applying Zen techniques to poker games. Jeffty is left to run his scam using a beautiful street girl, Mona, who bears an uncanny resemblance to James Dean's dead, sometime girlfriend, the real-life movie star Pier Angeli. It seems Steinberg may have orchestrated Dean's death in order to get close to Angeli. Jeffty's sure that when he sees this perfect replica, dressed up in 1950s clothes, Steinberg will refuse her nothing. While the swindle plays out, a cop called Dentphy pressures Jeffty to inform on Dumas. By the time the scam and story reach their climax, the characters don't know whom to trust and neither do readers. The preposterous plot is less important than Jeffty's voice, saturated with classic noir self-mockery and convincingly compromised morals. Even if Ridley ignores such glaring questions as why he keeps a gun he never uses, or why Dumas leaves Jeffty alone long enough to carry out his plan, die-hard fans of neo-pulp will forgive these slips with hardly a second thought. 50,000 first printing.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
The Best description of Broken Fingers ever,
By
This review is from: Love Is a Racket (Mass Market Paperback)
This is a very gritty novel with little hope, but Ridley's writing talent captures you. The writer's ability to describe feelings that most us have had but could never convey to others gives the book a sense of truth that sets it apart.Not for the squeamish, but a very worthwhile read.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Yeah it's good -- but not that good!,
By A Customer
This review is from: Love Is a Racket (Mass Market Paperback)
Lot's of 5 star reviews for this book, but I want to disagree some. Yes, there's some very good writing and humor packed into this book. But a lot of it really seemed pointless - like what was the point of having Nellis with his brilliant trick -- only to get blown away? The real plot develops 3/4 into the book, and I'm not sure I even liked the ending. I kept expecting Jeffty to be a better man than he was, and Ridley kept letting me down.
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of my favorite authors, he has done it again,
By
This review is from: Love Is a Racket (Mass Market Paperback)
John Ridley gets better with every book I read. I look forward to his novels with baited breath. I read Stray dogs (it became the movie Uturn, I believe) anyway The book was soo much better than the movie and then Love is a racket blew me away with the action and the things that can happen when you least expect it and then Everyone smokes in hell came out and I liked that even more, if he keeps it up he will be the only author I like enough to buy hardcover! if you like Quentin Tarantino movies you will like John Ridley's books even more. He is one of the best thriller/action fiction writers of his time.
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