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Neate, Patrick Twelve Bar Blues ISBN 13: 9780670887910

Twelve Bar Blues - Softcover

 
9780670887910: Twelve Bar Blues
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"Alex Garland watch out..." - Cosmopolitan Spanning three continents and two centuries TWELVE BAR BLUES is an epic tale of jazz and juju, fate, family and friendship which finally unfolds in the Louisiana bayou... At its heart is Lick Holden, a young jazz musician, in 1900 New Orleans. The story of Lick's search for his step-sister echoes throughout the other stories in the book - of Sylvia, the English hooker and Jim her young companion; of the mysterious seashell head-dress; of Musa, the itinerant witchdoctor and of Tongo, the frustrated African chief. And all of this structured around the harmonic progression of the 12 bar blues ...

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Review:
Patrick Neate's second novel, Twelve Bar Blues, is a bouncy, ebullient book, "populated" (as one of its cast reflects midway through), "by absurd characters, dead ends and half truths" that tumbles "toward a punch-line that would seem inevitable with hindsight". It positively brims with outlandish, hilarious and moving (if occasionally hokey) tales. Literally "every name's got a story" and by jingo Neate delights in spinning each part of his yarn. Roaming through the black slums and early jazz joints of the Louisiana bayou to Africa, London, New York, Chicago and New Orleans at the end of the 20th century, his vista is extraordinary. There's Tongo Kalulu, the chief of the Zimindo, a proud African tribe, who, confused by his wife and enraptured by an attractive female American archaeologist, seeks the advice of Musa, his sex-obsessed witch doctor. There's Sylvia di Napoli, a "coffee-coloured" retired London prostitute, who has travelled to America in the hope of discovering her real father¹s identity. Also along for the ride is Jim Tulloch, a scruffy, big-hearted young Englishman half her age. Gluing these seemingly disparate elements together is the tragic love story of Fortis James "Lick" Holden, a long forgotten Louisiana jazzman who allegedly taught Louis "Dipper" Armstrong the "meanin' of the word hot" and Sylvie Black, his prostitute "sister (who wasn't no blood relation)". Chock full of jazz, poverty, sex and death, this enjoyable novel jives to a note-perfect if predictable ending, dispensing intelligent critiques of racism and sexism along the way. --Travis Elborough
Review:
"Tale spinners, yarn weavers and myth makers are sprinkled like cayenne pepper on a Crescent City crawfish plate throughout Twelve Bar Blues, an atmospheric, expertly layered piece of literary fiction."

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  • PublisherViking
  • Publication date2001
  • ISBN 10 0670887919
  • ISBN 13 9780670887910
  • BindingPaperback
  • Number of pages416
  • Rating

Other Popular Editions of the Same Title

9780140286564: Twelve Bar Blues

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ISBN 10:  ISBN 13:  9780140286564
Publisher: Penguin, 2002
Softcover

  • 9780802140562: Twelve Bar Blues

    Grove ..., 2004
    Softcover

  • 9780802117274: Twelve Bar Blues

    Grove Pr, 2002
    Hardcover

  • 9783807701486: Twelve Bar Blues

    Hardcover

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Neate, Patrick
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Twelve Bar Blues Neate, Patrick
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