Sandman Slim (Sandman Slim Series #1)

by Richard Kadrey

Overview

Supernatural fantasy has a new antihero

Life sucks and then you die. Or, if you're James Stark, you spend eleven years in Hell as a hitman before finally escaping, only to land back in the hell-on-earth that is Los Angeles.

Now Stark's back, and ready for revenge. And absolution, and maybe even love. But when his first stop saddles him with an abusive talking head, Stark discovers that the road to absolution and revenge is much longer than you'd expect, and both Heaven and Hell have their own ideas for his future.

Resurrection sucks. Saving the world is worse.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780061714351
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	07/31/2012
Series:	Sandman Slim Series , #1
Pages:	416
Sales rank:	19,967
Product dimensions:	5.18(w) x 6.94(h) x 1.02(d)

About the Author

New York Times bestselling author Richard Kadrey has published nine novels, including Sandman Slim, Kill the Dead, Aloha from Hell, Devil Said Bang, Kill City Blues, Dead Set, Butcher Bird, and Metrophage. He has been immortalized as an action figure, his short story "Goodbye Houston Street, Goodbye" was nominated for a British Science Fiction Association Award, and his novel Butcher Bird was nominated for the Prix Elbakin in France. A freelance writer and photographer, he lives in San Francisco, California.

What People are Saying About This

Kim Harrison

“Nicotine and octane in equal parts might come close to the high-energy buzz from Richard Kadrey’s Sandman Slim. Crisp world building, recognizable and fully-realized characters, and a refreshingly unique storytelling style make for an absorbing read.Sandman Slim is my kind of hero.”

Charlaine Harris

“If Simon R. Green wrote an episode of Dog the Bounty Hunter, it would read much like Sandman Slim – violent, vivid, non-stop action of the supernatural kind. I couldn’t put it down.”

William Gibson

“The best B movie I’ve read in at least twenty years. An addictively satisfying, deeply amusing, dirty-ass masterpiece, Sandman Slim swerves hell-bent through our culture’s impacted gridlock of genres…it’s like watching Sergio Leone and Clive Barker co-direct from a script by Jim Thompson and S. Clay Wilson.”

Cory Doctorow

“The most hard-boiled piece of supernatural fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. … all confident and energetic and fresh and angry. I loved this book and all its screwed-up people.”

Editorial Reviews

If Simon R. Green wrote an episode of Dog the Bounty Hunter, it would read much like Sandman Slim – violent, vivid, non-stop action of the supernatural kind. I couldn’t put it down.

Charlaine Harris

Nicotine and octane in equal parts might come close to the high-energy buzz from Richard Kadrey’s Sandman Slim. Crisp world building, recognizable and fully-realized characters, and a refreshingly unique storytelling style make for an absorbing read.Sandman Slim is my kind of hero.

Kim Harrison

The most hard-boiled piece of supernatural fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. … all confident and energetic and fresh and angry. I loved this book and all its screwed-up people.

Cory Doctorow

The best B movie I’ve read in at least twenty years. An addictively satisfying, deeply amusing, dirty-ass masterpiece, Sandman Slim swerves hell-bent through our culture’s impacted gridlock of genres…it’s like watching Sergio Leone and Clive Barker co-direct from a script by Jim Thompson and S. Clay Wilson.

William Gibson

Sarcastic, irreverent and ridiculously enjoyable riff on the Urban Fantasy genre. … a lot like a mosh pit — rough, exuberant, unpredictable — and a heck of a lot of fun.

Miami Herald

Paced like greased lightning (watch out for friction burns on your turning finger), blend the movie-ish delights of tough guy noir and such smart-mouthgore-fests as “Reanimator” and “Army of Darkness”, seasoned by soupcons of Gaimanian romanticism and Koontzian sentiment.

Booklist

James Stark's great rep got him sent to hell. When his fame as a teenage magician attracted the attention of demons, they snatched him up and dispatched him to the inferno, where he spent the next 11 years as a sideshow freak entertaining Satan's minions. Now released and hell-bent for revenge, Stark loses no time seeking out the dark magic cabal that nearly destroyed him; but he soon discovers that in the war between heaven and hell, he is not the only one with big plans? Buyer's choice; now in mass-market paperback. (Hand-selling tip: Sandman Slim elicited raves from fellow cult figure William Gibson: "A wild, weird, nail-biting supernatural thriller?in the bestselling tradition of Chris Moore, Kim Harrison, and Warren Ellis? This man is mad, in the best way.")

Kadrey (Butcher Bird) provides biting humor, an over-the-top antihero and a rich stew of metaphoric language in this testosterone- and adrenaline-charged noir thriller. James Stark spent 11 years killing monsters in Lucifer's arena for the entertainment of fallen angels, but now he's back in seedy, magic-riddled L.A., trying to avenge his girlfriend's murder and hunt down Mason Faim, the black magician responsible for getting him sent "downtown." He meets with some initial success, beheading second-rate magician Kasabian (whose head becomes Stark's smart-mouthed sidekick), but he can't find Faim. Instead he encounters Homeland Security agents, a near-psychotic angel and some odd nonhuman, nonangelic beings called the kissi. Darkly atmospheric settings, such as a posh gentlemen's club where angels are tortured in an attempt to bring about Armageddon, bring this violent fantasy into sharp, compelling focus. (Aug.)

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Publishers Weekly

James Stark is perpetually nineteen and for the past eleven years he has been tortured by legions of demons in Hell. In possession of a magic key, he has escaped from Hell to return to the sordid underbelly of Los Angeles, where pornographic videos, tattoos, skinheads, and women who dress like little girls reign. Stark seeks revenge on the circle of friends whose incantations condemned him to a literal living hell and killed his girlfriend. Unbeknownst to Stark, his indestructibility in the face of dismemberment, broken bones, and other tortures has made him a legend in the Sub Rosa, or magic circle. One by one, he hunts down those who betrayed him, only to find that the ringleader is destroying them before he can get the answers he seeks. With a dear old alchemist friend and a new love interest on his side, Stark discovers his enemies' complex plan to unleash a magnitude of evil the world has never known. Stark is snarky, gritty, and cocky—and apparently above moral law as he sacrifices countless civilians on his quest for revenge. At times the reader does not know what the rules are—can you live in Hell, escape, and then visit if you have a magic key surgically implanted in your chest? Why can you not see into heaven as you can see into Hell? Is God actually an ineffective deity whose motives are questionable and whose minions are angry? The story turns the world upside down to make a profane comic book type of hero come out on top. Graphic and grotesque violence, sexual situations, and explicit adult language make this book better suited to more mature readers. Reviewer: Michele C. Hughes

Children's Literature - Michele C. Hughes