Driving with Ace [Paperback]

Dennis Latham (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2001

Spend a typical day with John Elvin during the summer of 1982. Lose your job. Fight a war. Attack your crazy psychiatrist. Have conversations with your most private body parts and set your dateâ€(tm)s dress on fire. Dodge gangster bullets and be chased by men wearing dresses. Youâ€(tm)ll abuse your mortgaged car and destroy a motel, all because youâ€(tm)re a virgin. At age twenty-four, John Elvin, must lose his virginity or go insane. When he meets another virgin, Lori Anderson, they decide to discover sex. What should be a wonderful date quickly turns into a comic nightmare. John is cursed with bad luck, a lunatic family, and psychotic enemies. When those forces unite to stop him from reaching his goal, John will either die or lose his virginity, and the odds are stacked against him. Driving With Ace features the bizarre lighter side of horror writer Dennis Latham, author of Michael In Hell and The Bad Season from PageFree Publishing, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 196 pages
• Publisher: Pagefree Publishing (September 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 193025217X
• ISBN-13: 978-1930252172
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,362,541 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dennis Latham, a Marine to the end, has published short fiction in several magazines but prefers writing action novels like the acclaimed Michael In Hell. His last book, Waiting For An Open Bed, is a collection of bizarre humor from the fictional Sunnyvale Mental Rehab in Fermonga, Ohio. He writes a bimonthly newsletter for combat veterans, The S-2 Report, dealing with VA benefits and PTSD. He currently lives in Indiana in a sometimes haunted Victorian house, where he has experienced bizarre events that defy accepted reality. The Kentucky Ghost Hunters, PINK, will make a return visit to his house in February 2012.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Driving With Latham, September 5, 2002

By 

W. Hicks (Stuart, Fl United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Driving with Ace (Paperback)

Author Dennis Latham creates a wacky bizarro world that is so textured and lifelike, that you can't help recognizing your own friends and family members in the life of John "Ace" Elvin. In his unending quest to lose his virginity before he loses his mind (and there's some question of how that's not already happened), John embarks on a wildly irreverent, psychotic journey involving his eager girlfriend, off-center parents, his brain-damaged Viet Nam vet brother Rock, a dangerous family of nut cases who own a garage and store, rampaging homosexuals, angry feminists, moribund bus riders, flying vaginas and talking penises (the sarcastic bestower of John's nickname `Ace'). Latham's style is lean and mean, tying all these divergent elements into a slam-bang, satisfying conclusion. As wild and improbable as these characters seemed, I hated to let them go at book's end, like a bunch of quirky favorite uncles or aunts whom your family never talks about. A somewhat twisted -- and very funny -- read. Highly recommended.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Gregg Araki would love to film this, January 22, 2002

By 

Golden Girls fan "Adam" (Alabama, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Driving with Ace (Paperback)

Just out of mere curiousity, I got this to see just what it was. I was so not ready for what I was about to read. From page one I knew this was going to be something wild and bizarre. As I read on I was appalled at some of the stuff that went on, and found myself putting the book down, and flipping through it a few days later. I knew that if made into a movie, Gregg Araki would be the ideal guy to film it. He's the mind behind the "Teen Apocalypse" trilogy, known for their herky jerky scenes and shots, as well as weird goings-on among teens today. Anyway, the basic plot involves some guy trying desperately to lose his virginity or else go insane, being he isn't already what with having talks with his "manhood" and carnal thoughts. When he meets another virgin, he tries his best to deflower her but something always goes wrong, and it usually involves a certain part of the male anatomy messing things up for him. There is a page in the book that asks you, the reader, what you think of the author. I have yet to tear it out and send it in, for I am trying to keep myself back from saying what I want to say. I have written two novels and one novelette, with two more novels due out this year. While I am not saying that my books are any better or worse than this, I must say that this book belongs in a class by itself.

4.0 out of 5 stars A True Story Involving This Novel from the Author, September 23, 2001

By 

Dennis Latham "ysgazelle" (Guilford, Indiana United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Driving with Ace (Paperback)

I can't really rate my own work, so the four stars doesn't count, but I can say that reactions to the novel have been great. Readers have called it the 'laugh all night' novel and the 'most bizarre laugh outloud comedy ever written.' It is my first novel outside the horror genre, and I had fun with it. I can guarantee you've never read anything like it. I wrote it because I like to read stories that either scare me or make me laugh, and if it makes you laugh I'm happy. (A true story about this novel) A friend of mine had a nervous breakdown while I was writing this novel. I sent him a few chapters while he was in the hospital. On the day he was to be released, the doctor came into his room while my friend was at breakfast, read the chapters, thought my friend wrote them, and gave him another week on the psych ward. When the doctor found out he didn't write the chapters, he told my friend that I should come and see him because he had an 'open bed' for me. My friend laughed about the entire episode, which was kind considering he got another week, and I guess my bed is still waiting for me.