About this title: In "Lush Life," Price tears the shiny veneer off the "new" New York to show the underground networks of control and violence beneath the glamour, in this novel that reads like a movie in prose" ("New York Times").
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Description: Very good. Dust Cover Missing. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. Former Library book. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Like New. May be shiny, in some instances dust jackets are not included, no missing pages, no damage to binding, may have a remainder mark. read more
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux
Date Published: 2008
ISBN-13:9780374299255ISBN:0374299250
Description: Very good in fine dust jacket. TIGHT, BRIGHT, UNMARKED, A FEW INT PAGES SHOW BIT OF WEAR, GREAT READER. Glued binding. Paper over boards. With dust jacket. 455 p. Audience: General/trade. read more
Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More. read more
Description: Good. Paperback. Cover shows light wear to edges, minor spine and corner creasing. Edge of pages has few yellow stains. Pages themselves are clean and bright, no markings. Binding is intact. read more
"In Lush Life, Richard Price uses the police procedural to describe the clash between the old and the new Lower East Side, the immigrant communities and the gentrification of those same communities into restaurants, bars, boutiques and prime real estate, between the projects and the strivers, between the collapsed synagogues and the new highrises.
What's most brilliant and unerring about Price's novel is his ear for dialogue. This is a book, as Eudora Welty has said, that is "written by ear." He captures the voices of the young urban professionals, the police on the Quality of Life Task Force, the African American and Latino youth of the housing projects. In addition, he discloses the simmering race and class tensions beneath the surface of the "new" New York City."
"Richard Price isn't exactly a plot-driven author. Rather than rushing the reader along from point A to point B to solve a mystery, Price wants the reader to spend time with his characters, to the point that we're crawling under their skins and learning everything we could possibly want to know about them; the good, the bad and especially the ugly. This approach can be hit or miss for Price. When immersing the reader in the underworld of drug-dealing in Clockers, it makes for a fascinating experience. When the characters are less than intriguing, such as in Freedomland, the book can turn into a bit of a slog. Fortunately, Lush Life is more peaks than valleys as Price leads us through a New York murder. From the trenchant and frustrating process that the police go through in investigating the crime to the baleful eye cast upon those left in its wake, Price presents a worm's-eye view of big-city crime in the 21st century. And cudos to actor Bobby Carnivale, the narrator of the auidobook. He is pitch-perfect on giving a distinctive voice to every character, never giving in to over-acting the story that he's presenting. More importantly, the New York accents never drift over into stereotypical "New Yawk" accents."
"3.5 stars really (why is it that the only half star I insist on declaring is the 3.5? Maybe because it marks the difference between pretty enjoyable and very enjoyable? There is a step between those two for sure).
I listened to the audiobook recording which is narrated (to excellent effect) by Bobby Cannavale. Price's novel feels cinematic at every turn, which makes sense considering his history as a screenwriter and credits on The Wire. I was pretty riveted to the story and I think this may get me on a push to do some more crime fiction.
Still, characters (particularly female characters) were thinly drawn and I felt less than satisfied by the conclusion even though all of the threads are wrapped up pretty tidily. Maybe that's a peril of the genre, but I had a hard time recognizing the book that got such very, very high praise from critics in 2008.
Still, this was well worth my time. Maybe I should do some Elmore Leonard now?"
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