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8797999's review against another edition
4.0
A very enjoyable and interesting read, the author was new to me but I enjoyed his writing very much. The plot was great and full of several twists. The ending I didn't see coming but the perpetrators I did.
Engaging characters and some fun dialogue between them.
I would like to get around to reading the rest of this series and the authors other series which shares a book in this one.
Easy to see why this book and the author is held in high regards.
Engaging characters and some fun dialogue between them.
I would like to get around to reading the rest of this series and the authors other series which shares a book in this one.
Easy to see why this book and the author is held in high regards.
matty_loves_dogs's review
dark
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
_ottavia_'s review against another edition
5.0
"Poteva essere pure il mio, di posto, un luogo in cui era possibile affogare la noia nell'alcol e pentirsi delle passate violenze, per poi comprare l'assoluzione al solo costo di una birra."
Presi gli schemi hard boiled di Hammett e Chandler, la mancanza di morale e la perdita dell'innocenza dei noir, i chilometri e chilometri macinati attraverso gli States alla ricerca di Betty Sue Flowers, vera e propria ossessione, e avrete il romanzo di Crumley. Considerato ormai fondamentale, vero e proprio capolavoro di scrittura, "L'ultimo vero bacio" è uno di quei romanzi che ha influenzato intere schiere di autori. Crumley non arrivò più a simili vette, pur passando la sua carriera a provarci, ma un romanzo del genere, davvero, è inimitabile.
Presi gli schemi hard boiled di Hammett e Chandler, la mancanza di morale e la perdita dell'innocenza dei noir, i chilometri e chilometri macinati attraverso gli States alla ricerca di Betty Sue Flowers, vera e propria ossessione, e avrete il romanzo di Crumley. Considerato ormai fondamentale, vero e proprio capolavoro di scrittura, "L'ultimo vero bacio" è uno di quei romanzi che ha influenzato intere schiere di autori. Crumley non arrivò più a simili vette, pur passando la sua carriera a provarci, ma un romanzo del genere, davvero, è inimitabile.
marinaracloud's review
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
posies23's review
5.0
Some of the others reviewers have said it, and I'm inclined to agree: this book is a mix between Hunter S. Thompson's FEAR AND LOATHING IN LOS ANGELES and a detective novel by Hammett or Fredric Brown.
Part character study and part insane road trip, this novel hits all of the tropes of detective fiction and throws them into the seedy 1970's. It's all here: drugs, prostitution, pornography, etc.
Compelling writing and a great POV character make this one of the better reads of the year. The subject matter may turn some off to it, but it really held my interest. Highly recommended.
Part character study and part insane road trip, this novel hits all of the tropes of detective fiction and throws them into the seedy 1970's. It's all here: drugs, prostitution, pornography, etc.
Compelling writing and a great POV character make this one of the better reads of the year. The subject matter may turn some off to it, but it really held my interest. Highly recommended.
judythereader's review
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
gregfb15's review
dark
funny
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
codyisreading's review
5.0
"Youth endures all things, kings and poetry and love. Everything except time."
James Crumley's The Last Good Kiss follows C.W. Sughrue, a Montana investigator that moonlights at a topless bar. When he's hired to track down a famous author, his travels lead him down a rabbit hole that pulls him from Montana to California to Colorado and back home again. Set against the hippie hangover years of the early 70's. Sughrue scrambles across the Northwest, every location seemingly within a day's drive yet impossibly far away.
I'm struggling to write an adequate review because I LOVED THIS BOOK. I re-read it immediately after I finished, and I honestly can't remember the last time that happened. I was struck by how much of this book shouldn't work because its bones are so rote. It has all the pieces you'd expect: an alcoholic, cynical private eye, a boozy author lamenting the good ol' days, a missing girl, an old money fortune on the line and the criminal underworld. All these elements sound like old hat if not for the fact that Crumley wrote the novel in 1978 and damn near perfected the form.
The Last Good Kiss is bitingly funny, elegiac, and suspenseful. Crumley draws you in with the very first sentence: "When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon." How can you not immediately fall in love with prose like that?
Oh yeah, and did I mention there's an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts?!
I could find 100 other examples of the lyrical quality of Crumley's writing, but I honestly think this is something people need to experience unspoiled. His writing is unique yet unpretentious, and his writing style evokes beautiful imagery without becoming verbose.
I cannot lavish enough praise on this book. Crumley is a hidden gem, an author I was unaware of yet clearly overlooked in his genre. He commands the story confidently and at a brisk 250 pages, Crumley spins a heartbreaking tale of loss and redemption with fully realized characters you'd have no trouble imagining meeting on the road.
READ THIS BOOK.
James Crumley's The Last Good Kiss follows C.W. Sughrue, a Montana investigator that moonlights at a topless bar. When he's hired to track down a famous author, his travels lead him down a rabbit hole that pulls him from Montana to California to Colorado and back home again. Set against the hippie hangover years of the early 70's. Sughrue scrambles across the Northwest, every location seemingly within a day's drive yet impossibly far away.
I'm struggling to write an adequate review because I LOVED THIS BOOK. I re-read it immediately after I finished, and I honestly can't remember the last time that happened. I was struck by how much of this book shouldn't work because its bones are so rote. It has all the pieces you'd expect: an alcoholic, cynical private eye, a boozy author lamenting the good ol' days, a missing girl, an old money fortune on the line and the criminal underworld. All these elements sound like old hat if not for the fact that Crumley wrote the novel in 1978 and damn near perfected the form.
The Last Good Kiss is bitingly funny, elegiac, and suspenseful. Crumley draws you in with the very first sentence: "When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon." How can you not immediately fall in love with prose like that?
Oh yeah, and did I mention there's an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts?!
I could find 100 other examples of the lyrical quality of Crumley's writing, but I honestly think this is something people need to experience unspoiled. His writing is unique yet unpretentious, and his writing style evokes beautiful imagery without becoming verbose.
I cannot lavish enough praise on this book. Crumley is a hidden gem, an author I was unaware of yet clearly overlooked in his genre. He commands the story confidently and at a brisk 250 pages, Crumley spins a heartbreaking tale of loss and redemption with fully realized characters you'd have no trouble imagining meeting on the road.
READ THIS BOOK.
duparker's review
5.0
Great hard boiled mystery. It's got a lot of positives, the over the top characters, the plot save the seventies but not flashy seventies vibe. I'll read the rest of the series, no doubt.