About this title: Detective Milo Dragovitch spends too much time boozing until he gets caught up in a case involving two-bit criminals and an old lady on the run.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Vintage
Date Published: 1984-09-12
ISBN-13:9780394725765ISBN:039472576X
Description: Fair. Pages clean & tight, wear to cover, lift to cover edge, tanning to pgsFirst Class shipping if available for faster service. read more
Description: Acceptable. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Description: Good. 039472576X This book is in Good Used Condition. The Book shows some signs of wear. The pages edges are dusty/dirty/stained. There may be some markings inside the book. 100% Money Back Guarantee! ! ! read more
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Vintage Books USA
Date Published: 1984
ISBN-13:9780394725765ISBN:039472576X
Description: Good. No DJ Issued. Good. No dust jacket as issued. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 228 p. Vintage Crime/Black Lizard. Audience: General/trade. Good title in good condition. Pages are clean and tight. Covers show some light edgewear and bumping. read more
Edition: None Stated
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Vintage Contemporaries, New York
Date Published: 1983
ISBN-13:9780394725765ISBN:039472576X
Description: No Illustrations. Very Good. No Jacket. EX-LIBRARY. EXPECTED MARKINGS AND ATTACHMENTS. ILLUSTRATED PAPERBACK COVER IS LIGHTLY FADED WITH LIGHT STAINING, CORNERS BUMPED, LIGHT SHELFWEAR TO EDGES. INTERIOR PAGES HAVE LIGHT SOILING. read more
Edition: First edition.
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Vintage Books USA
Date Published: 1984
ISBN-13:9780394725765ISBN:039472576X
Description: Very good. No dust jacket as issued. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 228 p. Vintage Crime/Black Lizard. Audience: General/trade. read more
Edition: First Edition
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Random House
Date Published: c1983
Description: Good+ in Near Fine dust jacket. Ex-library with usual distinctinctions, small faint stains on bottom of fore edge, in a bright dustjacket (no library stickers) in a new clear mylar DJ cover. read more
Edition: 2d ptg.
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: Random House, New York
Date Published: 1983
ISBN-13:9780394521954ISBN:0394521951
Description: Book: Very Good. DJ: Very Good. 8vo. 228 pp. 5 3/4 x 8 ½. Black boards with qtr black cloth, stamped in gold on front and spine. Tan glossy dj, price clipped. read more
"Another neo-noir set in Montana, this time starring Crumley's other alcoholic PI, Milo. Here he's caught in a web of deception and intrigue that begins with an exploding car and ends with a bloody massacre. In between is a twisted coke-fueled romp featuring a bunch of hot, corrupt women and sad, defeated men. Crumley is at his best in the quieter parts-- when he lets Milo talk about the changing face of the west, and the disconnection he feels watching the hedonism of the 70s turn into the materialism of the early 1980s. But at the end the book turns into a middling episode of the A-Team or Magnum PI, complete with the evil, sneering plutocrat with machinations for the local Indians' land. So that's a bit of a let down."
"If you like your detective fiction raw and nasty, James Crumley's Dancing Bear is your cup of meat. Its protagonist Milo Dragovitch pursues two cases at once, which quickly entwine him in a shipment of cocaine, poachers, stunning and disaffected characters, grenades, AK-47s, and a slew of corpses strewn across the macho backwoods of Montana. As the detective sinks deeper into this morass, he spends as much time snorting "toots," belting shots of peppermint schnapps, and skirt-chasing (though that puts it politely) as he does sleuthing.
The violent, toxic nihilism of this environment may be familiar to fans of Hunter Thompson. Dragovitch is a mess of compulsions. Crumley doesn't quite have Raymond Chandler's way with a metaphor, but it's hard to argue with Crumley's intimacy with place, however over-the-top. I'm of two minds. My preference is for a writer like Ross MacDonald, Chandler's true heir who with utter restraint, was able to depict Southern California as a blasted moral landscape. Crumley is doing something similar, but using a blowtorch to do it."
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