Customer Reviews

Be Cool

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(14)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

I work in Hollywood as a runner, have for years. None of the characters in this book even vaguely resemble anybody I work with. Least of all Chili Palmer. Nor is Mr. Leonards dialog as spot-on as it used to be. Ryan's Rules was one of the greatest books I ever read. I've read it four or five times. Be Cool is at the opposite end of the spectrum. It gets worse. The dialog is so-so the characters are unbeleivable, and the action isn't real. In Ryans Rules the guys were robbing liquor stores and it was totally real, in Be Cool the one and only scene that doesn't cause a groan is the opening scene at Swingers restaurant where Tommy Athens is talking about the movie he wants Chili to make and Chili asks what's the movie about and Tommy Athens goes: "Me", now that's Holywood. On the other hand, when the 6 foot 6 Samoan barges into the studio exec womans office and bashes her TV with a baseball bat, anybody who's ever been anywhere near a studio lot will hoot with astonishment. This scene makes a deafening clunk. And then, after behaving like that, apparently we're supposed to beleive the big Samoan just strolls off the lot, because without a pass he wouldn't've been parking on the lot in the first place, where in real life the man would be getting treated like a king, as in Rodney. All I can say is give it up Mr. Leonard. You couldn't possibly need the money, could you? And if you don't you're embarrassing yourself.

As a fan of Elmore Leonard, and particularly of his popular novel, Get Shorty, I eagerly anticipated the release of this continuation of the tale of Chili Palmer. Dismayed was I to discover, therefore, that Be Cool was so true to the original that it could have, in fact, been the same book. Don't get me wrong, I like Chili Palmer as much as the next guy, but Mr. Leonard seemed to have missed the fact that for a sequel to be successful, it must take beloved characters and place them in NEW situations. This time, we find the same Chili doing the same things he did in Get Shorty, albeit with a little less violence, only this time he's doing it in the music world instead of the movie world. Throughout the novel, I found myself getting a more than vague sense of deja vu - I've seen it all before. The book is not, of course, without a few shining moments. A distressingly macabre exchange between a myopic Jewish hitman and a jive-talking, ghetto blasting music producer concerning the best type of baseball bat when a skull is the target provides a great moment of typical Leonard black humor. Leonard's signature stylistic devices - flashback narration and wonderful use of dialect - are omnipresent throughout. Be Cool does have its advantages, but it's possible to save money - just put on an Aerosmith album and re-read Get Shorty. Sorry, folks, but we've been here and done this.

I was amused by a previous review stating that a high school student had read "Be Cool" as an English assignment. That's great if your teaching a novel with zero character development, zero story, hell, practically no plot. And I've enjoyed some of Leonard's other books. And the most embarassing part is Leonard's take on present day rock 'n roll. I can see him desperately picking the brains of people he thinks might be "hep" to the current scene. He breaks the first rule of writing; write what you know about. This book was a mess. Were the blurb folks paid off?

Believe me, I'm a fan. And I know that every swing of the bat can't be a home run. Still, this one was a disappointment. Anybody just starting on the Leonard body of work should bypass this one in favor of almost any of his others. I give it two stars ( instead of one ) simply because Leonard can't write anything but snappy, engaging dialogue.

this is a book of dreary and unrelated dialogue which goes on and on and accomplishes nothing unless one is interested in the use of five letter words. The plot is miniscule.

The characters lacked character and substance, the setting was unbelievable. Since this was not listed as a farce I can only think the author was serious, if so he failed miserably. This is not the first Elmore Leonard book that I have bought and read, but it will be the last! As someone who reads a lot of books and as a matter of principle, finishes every book that I start, this book was a cahllenge to my principles.

Elmore Leonard, my favorite beach novelist, has put out another Chili Palmer novel (of "Get Shorty" fame). Not as either believable or as rip-roaringly funny as Get Shorty was.... Be Cool follows Chili into the music industry in California. The sequel to his famous movie (called, "Get Leo" in this book, although why, I don't know... we all know it's Get Shorty) was a bust, so he is onto searching for another story-line for another movie. As Elmore Leonard novels go, I thought this one was fairly weak... Leonard seemed out of his familiar surroundings and I miss, frankly, the bare-faced shysters, the loan sharks, the semi-mafiosos and the slick con-men of most of his other books. This novel didn't have the same wonderful surprising twists and turns... Chili's relationship with Elaine seemed forced, Linda Moon started out with some promise but Leonard is so busy trying to develop other characters (like the bizarre, huge Samoan homosexual body-guard) that we never feel we've completely 'gotten into' any of the characters. I will give Leonard a lot of credit however, for continuing to be the best at plot manipulation... how he has Chili manage the police, the Russian mafia, the record industry mafia, and just about everyone else so that he emerges with the usual clean nose, is a tribute to Leonard's abilities to think and write so complexly.

This, the sequel to "Get Shorty," takes Chili Palmer from the world of film to the music industry. Although one of the book's themes is a very self-conscious attempt to comment on the nature of sequels, it falls pretty flat since it's just not that good. The behind the scenes music stuff comes off as very cliché and dated, and just doesn't work very well. There is the usual cast of wacky Leonard characters, some more entertaining than others--but as I feel about other of his books, wackiness alone doesn't cut it.

I have, I believe, read every book that Elmore has written, and would rate this book one of his failures. The book, a sequel to "Get Shorty," rambles for nearly 100 pages before it develops any sort of plot. I hope that Elmore goes back to Florida for his next book.

The only thing that redeemed this book (unless you count the pat story line, trite dialogue and thin characterization) was Chili Palmer's uncanny ability to evoke the voice of John Travolta. I LOVED Get Shorty and was hoping that Be Cool would "one-up" it -- but it barely held my attention.