Book: The Last Hot Time by John M. Ford


Good, wish it were better

John M. Ford
The Last Hot Time
Tor, 2000
ISBN: 0-312-85545--1
$22.95
205 pages

In The Last Hot Time, it seems that very long ago, elves sometimes came to earth from wherever they're from. Then, for reasons of their own, they stopped coming. And then sometime around the year 2000, they came back. They seem to have caused some disasters just after returning and they put an end to television, but now they seem to be getting along with humans mostly. In that world, Danny Holman, an Iowa farm boy, leaves home to move to Chicago. Chicago is one of the places where elves come and go, and magic works in at least part of the city. On his way to Chicago, Danny sees a car shot up by elves. Thanks to his EMT training, he saves the life of the woman who was shot and goes to work for her boss, Mr Patrise. Mr Patrise is a gangster of a sort, but a pretty nice one. While he works for Mr Patrise, Danny (now called Doc Hallownight), does Something Remarkable. After what seems to be his fashion, Mr Ford only narrates around the event. Exactly what is supposed to have happened isn't quite clear to me.

Described like that, you'd probably suppose that I didn't like the book at all. In fact, I rather did like it. There are a lot of interesting characters in this slim volume, and the atmosphere Mr Ford creates is lots of fun. If I knew many gangster movies, it might have made me think of them. But I don't, so I kept thinking of Rick's cafe as it might have been in the years before the movie Casablanca started.

The copy-editor left an apostrophe out of "I'm " on page 97.

Posted: Thu - August 5, 2004 at 07:48   Main   Category: 

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