The problem with so-called “summer reads” is that all
too often they’re nothing but plot, barely bothering with niceties like
humor, wordplay, or any other padding for the bare bones of the story’s
structure. And sure, authors can bank to a degree on a reader’s need
for narrative resolution—I stayed up until 2 am the other night
reading Hollywood Is Like High School with Money, just to find
out how it ended, but I sure did skim most of it.
My favorite summer read thus far is Richard Kadrey’s Sandman
Slim, a witty genre-melder that satisfies certain basic seasonal
requirements (fast paced, sorta trashy, not too challenging) without
sacrificing a single sentence’s worth of humor or originality.
Sandman Slim is a classic LA noir, with a few minor
tweaks—namely, a casual acceptance of the existence of the
supernatural. The book’s titular character is a magician who’s recently
returned to Los Angeles, having spent the last 17 years living as an
assassin in hell. He’s on a revenge mission after the former friends
who killed his girlfriend and banished him to hell, and he’s equally
comfortable using guns or magic to dispense his enemies. Kadrey jams
his narrative with outlandishly hard-boiled one-liners, bad guys with
world-ending agendas, and an innovatively creepy femme fatale. It’s a
fast read, and a fun one—a guilty pleasure you don’t actually
have to feel guilty about.