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Jayakrishnan's Reviews > Mr Majestyk
Mr Majestyk
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"I want to get a melon crop in. That's what I want to do."
I watched the Charles Bronson film a year ago. I wanted to see what the book was like. Elmore Leonard's writing exudes an easy toughness. The influence of Hemingway is undeniable. The first scene at a gas station, told from the point of view of a gas station attendant, a Mexican woman who wants to use a toilet and the men who are traveling with her is amazing in how easily Leonard shifts from the inner thoughts of one character to the other. A small but important act of humanity where he convinces the gas station attendant to let the migrant workers use the toilet introduces us to Vincent Majestyk.
At the center of the book is a Vietnam war veteran turned farmer, dedicated to picking his crop. But a run in with an assassin, Frank Renda, forces Majestyk to summon some of the savagery that he picked up during the war.
Despite the sparse prose, the characters are vivid. Here is Frank Renda, wondering what he is doing with his boring girlfriend and life - "She was starting to annoy him. Not too much yet, but starting. He had dumped a wife who had bored the shit out of him, talking all the time, buying clothes and showing them to him, and now he had a girl who was a college graduate drama major, very bright, who read dirty books. Books she thought were dirty. He said to himself. Where are you? What the fuck are you doing?"
The action is set in Edna, Texas - "The hospital in Edna had an emergency room and eighteen beds, but it was more an outpatient clinic than a hospital and looked even more like a contemporary yellow-brick grade school. For almost a year Majestyk had thought it was a school."
I wonder why an author who revels in his sparseness inserted this detail. Was it a comment on small town American architecture? Anyway, Leonard does not romanticize the agrarian life or anything. Except for a brief paragraph explaining why Majestyk the war veteran became a farmer. This is my fourth book by Leonard and I feel like I want to read everything that he has ever written.
I watched the Charles Bronson film a year ago. I wanted to see what the book was like. Elmore Leonard's writing exudes an easy toughness. The influence of Hemingway is undeniable. The first scene at a gas station, told from the point of view of a gas station attendant, a Mexican woman who wants to use a toilet and the men who are traveling with her is amazing in how easily Leonard shifts from the inner thoughts of one character to the other. A small but important act of humanity where he convinces the gas station attendant to let the migrant workers use the toilet introduces us to Vincent Majestyk.
At the center of the book is a Vietnam war veteran turned farmer, dedicated to picking his crop. But a run in with an assassin, Frank Renda, forces Majestyk to summon some of the savagery that he picked up during the war.
Despite the sparse prose, the characters are vivid. Here is Frank Renda, wondering what he is doing with his boring girlfriend and life - "She was starting to annoy him. Not too much yet, but starting. He had dumped a wife who had bored the shit out of him, talking all the time, buying clothes and showing them to him, and now he had a girl who was a college graduate drama major, very bright, who read dirty books. Books she thought were dirty. He said to himself. Where are you? What the fuck are you doing?"
The action is set in Edna, Texas - "The hospital in Edna had an emergency room and eighteen beds, but it was more an outpatient clinic than a hospital and looked even more like a contemporary yellow-brick grade school. For almost a year Majestyk had thought it was a school."
I wonder why an author who revels in his sparseness inserted this detail. Was it a comment on small town American architecture? Anyway, Leonard does not romanticize the agrarian life or anything. Except for a brief paragraph explaining why Majestyk the war veteran became a farmer. This is my fourth book by Leonard and I feel like I want to read everything that he has ever written.
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Thanks Still. It is an awesome novel and they made a great movie out of it.
Really solid review, your quote insertions are compelling and much like a picture of the story. To your question in your review: I think he described the hospital in question, at length and oddly informative and descriptive for him, because he had this place in his mind from an actual building seen somewhere. I am on a long and winding journey to read every one of E.L. novels.
Cheers Davey. Interesting theory on why Leonard described the hospital. You could be right.
"I am on a long and winding journey to read every one of E.L. novels."
Me too. I am glad there are so many of them.
Great review and i like what you said about the detailed info about the hospital. I.started reading my first 11 books of EL around 2011-2012, I rate him very highly as a great writer, quality style, master of dialogue, tough real characters and great eye for sparse descriptions. No wonder Dashiell Hammett is my all favourite hardboiled detective, crime author and Hemingway is a fav classic/modern great. I took a break from his works but I'm back to reading every book he ever wrote. Last few years I have only read his westerns, he is the best westerns author by far imho. :)
Mohammed wrote: "Great review and i like what you said about the detailed info about the hospital. I.started reading my first 11 books of EL around 2011-2012, I rate him very highly as a great writer, quality style..."Thank you, Mohammed. I have a collection of Elmore's Westerns. Have not read them.
Thanks, Cbj!