The Drive-In: A Double-Feature Omnibus [Mass Market Paperback]

Joe R. Lansdale (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1997

Imagine a jam-packed drive-in on a Saturday night. You're kicking back in your car with the popcorn and enjoying a good old-fashioned scary monster movie when, suddenly, the drive-in itself becomes the movie, with all its attendant thrills. And dangers. A hard-hitting combination of vivid imagery, camaraderie and terror, The Drive-In is a double feature Lansdale fans will not want to leave.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"There is a certain glee in my work," says Joe R. Lansdale. "But for me, it heightens the horror." The Drive-In: A B-Movie with Blood and Popcorn and its sequel (The Drive-In 2)--both well known to Lansdale fans--are back in this welcome omnibus edition. The story is about a bunch of affectionately described characters in small-town Texas who go to a horror-movie marathon at the local drive-in. While they're watching The Toolbox Murders, a bright red meteor with a toothy smile swoops down and traps them in the drive-in for all time. Then the fun begins: endless re-runs of the same movies and fights over concession food, followed by anarchy, religion, cannibalism, bodily transformation, crucifixion, mad bikers, and a supernatural Popcorn King. It's not just silly, though; it's social commentary. The lesser (but equally surreal) sequel further explores the end-of-the-world scenario. As Lansdale himself says, "The Drive-In is quirky as hell. It's kind of a cult book, and it's not for everybody." The Drive-In was nominated for a 1989 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel.

About the Author

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of Act of Love and The Nightrunners, also available from Carroll & Graf.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf Publishers (August 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 078670442X
• ISBN-13: 978-0786704422
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,941,048 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joe R. Lansdale is the author of over thirty novels and numerous short stories. His work has appeared in national anthologies, magazines, and collections, as well as numerous foreign publications. He has written for comics, television, film, newspapers, and Internet sites. His work has been collected in eighteen short-story collections, and he has edited or co-edited over a dozen anthologies. He has received the Edgar Award, eight Bram Stoker Awards, the Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the British Fantasy Award, the Grinzani Cavour Prize for Literature, the Herodotus Historical Fiction Award, the Inkpot Award for Contributions to Science Fiction and Fantasy, and many others. His novella Bubba Hotep was adapted to film by Don Coscarelli, starring Bruce Campbell and Ossie Davis. His story "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road" was adapted to film for Showtime's "Masters of Horror." He is currently co-producing several films, among them The Bottoms, based on his Edgar Award-winning novel, with Bill Paxton and Brad Wyman, and The Drive-In, with Greg Nicotero. He is Writer In Residence at Stephen F. Austin State University, and is the founder of the martial arts system Shen Chuan: Martial Science and its affiliate, Shen Chuan Family System. He is a member of both the United States and International Martial Arts Halls of Fame. He lives in Nacogdoches, Texas with his wife, dog, and two cats.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Lansdale at his finest!, March 16, 2000

By 

William Errickson Jr. (Raleigh, NC United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Drive-In: A Double-Feature Omnibus (Mass Market Paperback)

Joe R. Lansdale is true pulp fiction: fast, cheap and out of control. Known mostly for hard-bitten, outrageous crime novels featuring Hap and Leonard, and a bunch of extraordinarily grim, nasty, bleak horror stories, Lansdale spent most of the late 80s/early 90s in genre obscurity. Writers with a higher profile but less raw talent left him in the dust. With "Mucho Mojo" he finally got what he deserved, and NOW "The Drive-In" novels are back in print, hallelujah, the Good Lord be praised! This is cheesy schlock in the best sense--a mind-boggling Texan SF misadventure featuring the Popcorn King, an all night horrormovie marathon, creatures from outer space, mechanical dinosaurs, the end of the world and naked boobies. Lansdale does it all here. Quirky, off-beat and strange don't do it justice. Just buy it, and discover what a unique, comic, horrifying and flat-out entertaining writer Joe Lansdale is!

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Comets and popcorn and suicide trees, oh my..., May 26, 2000

By 

mellion108 (Michigan, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Drive-In: A Double-Feature Omnibus (Mass Market Paperback)

This book is flat-out hilarious! One day Jack and his friends are typical boys on the verge of adulthood, the next they are caught in a nightmarish, other world created when a comet near-misses the drive in where they are enjoying an all night horror show. Stuck in the dark world of the drive in, watching only violent bloody horror movies over and over, eating only concession-stand food, Jack narrates a world that is terrifying but not without its humor. And that's just part one of this incredible tale. It continues with our intrepid heroes getting out of the drive-in to explore the next evolution of their new world. (a world in which a baby dinosaur is automatically named Toothy before it gobbles down an unburied corpse) It would take me too long to describe the numerous quirky, scary and surreal characters and happenings in this omnibus. I was glued to this book until I finished it. It's hilarious, it's surreal, it's chilling, and I kept shaking my head saying "no way!" before I plunged right into the next chapter.

Lansdale is one of the few authors who can take grisly events and plant a sarcastic, hilarious slant to them. And succeed! I laughed out loud throughout while also cringing from some of the word pictures Lansdale creates here. Make no mistake, this is horror at its best. But it's also a witty look at what happens to us when we lose the most basic of worldly trappings. Reading Lansdale is always like stepping into a roller-coaster world, and any of his books are more than worth your time.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally, back in circullation!, December 27, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (Canoga Park, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Drive-In: A Double-Feature Omnibus (Mass Market Paperback)

Ten years out of print has been way too long for this gem to be hidden away from the reader (I had to hunt three years to find a thrashed used copy). This book was written for the thinking man who, deep down in his heart, loves bad, cheesy horror movies. You know,the kind you rent with a group of friends, order pizza, drink cheap beer, and make fun of throughout the duration. Lansdale, one of our finest, most creative writers has an obvious love for this genre of trash cinema. He creates an apocolyptic world where four teenages become trapped in a drive in theatre during an all-night festival of trash films. Their lives become the most horrifying film of them all. This novel is a definite must-have for those nights when your friends are out of town, the pizza parlor goes out of business, and the beer has gone flat.