Everybody Smokes in Hell - Softcover

Ridley, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 059304469X ISBN 13: 9780593044698

Publisher: Bantam Press, 2000

Synopsis

Paul Scott is what you'd call a loser. When the key to his dreams, the last mastertape of a suicided rockstar, and some stolen drugs are dropped into his lap, the resulting madness stretches from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, leaving a trail of blood, bodies and broken hearts.

About this title

Review:

Hollywood and her tramp sisters fame and fortune were nothing but a bunch of whore seducers. With a wink and a smile and a wiggle of the ass, they shanghaied you over to some dark corner where their brother, the twin goons despair and defeat, waited to come at you with all the pleasantries of a back-alley abortion.

John Ridley welcomes you back to his Los Angeles--a place soaked in the grime of seedy corruption and all manner of venality. He obviously despises the place "more than cancer" yet he displays an uncanny knack in wringing one he ll of a sleazy tale from it's dream-shattering streets. Akin to theanti- heros in Stray Dogs and Love Is A Racket, Paris Scott, a convenience store clerk, stumbles on a supposedly "can't lose" plan. When Paris finds a man slumped on the hood of his rust-friendly AMC Gremlin, Paris drives the stranger to his Bel Air mansion, where he is suddenly identified as Ian Jarmaine, Rock Superstar and soon-to-be-suicide victim. After being called a loser, Paris exacts revenge by stealing the master tape of Jarmaine's farewell album. Unfortunately, it ends up sharing the same hiding place with a large amount of heroin that his roommate stole from the local dealer. Now, a Hollywood agent, a drug dealer and a nymphomaniac assassin are hot on his trail from LA to Las Vegas, creating a mad chain reaction that leaves a pungent trail of bodies, blood and broken hearts. Not only does Ridley write with vivid and passionate description but, in the space of three novels, he has become the foremost purveyor of riotously black humour (Jarmaine's suicide is a frankly hilarious and a tragic reality to his romanticised ideal). This book is raucously non-PC and revels in its identity as a hedonistic road trip. Keep hating LA, John, the results are so enjoyable. --Danny Graydon

From the Back Cover:

From the author of Love Is a Racket comes a savage black comedy that chronicles the mayhem unleashed by one hapless young man trying, none too successfully, to make it in Hollywood.

Paris Scott works nights at a convenience store, was just dumped by his girl, and drives a '74 Gremlin. He's what you'd call a loser. When the key to his dreams - the last mastertape of a very famous and freshly suicided rock star - and a small fortune's worth of stolen drugs, which he doesn't know he has, are dropped into his lap, Paris might as well be catching a neutron bomb. As the people who want the tape become dangerously confused with the people who want the dope, the resulting madness stretches from Los Angeles to Las Vegas, leaving a trail of blood, bodies and broken hearts in the rear-view mirror.

Dope dealers, Hollywood agents, two-bit criminals, strippers, rock stars, beautiful women, not-so-beautiful women, honest working Joes - no one comes out clean in this raucous romp-and-stomp, which lays out the proof that, without a doubt, everybody smokes in hell.

About this edition

• Publisher: Bantam Press
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 059304469X
• ISBN 13: 9780593044698
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256