Customer Reviews

Give Us a Kiss

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When our book club chose this book as part of its new author day, I thought "what kind of trash is this." But like a good shot of moonshine, it was revolting enough to leave its mark and tasty enough to make me want more. HOnestly, why hasn't this guy gotten his due? There is more slick writing, quirky characters and raunchy adventure i nthis book then many books twice its length. And with the lead character a sort of hillbilly writer/philosopher (that is not a contradiction in terms!) one has a narrator throughout the book who never fails to make you laugh. THe book centers around the adventures of Redmond Doyle, a hack writer who returns home to the Ozarks from a more "high falutin" environment, only to find out that you cannot escape your past or your roots. As he gets pulled into the inevitable feuds and violence that is part of Ozark lore, he wonders why he ever left in the first place.With plenty of fights, sex, hillbilly weirdness and the ramblings of the main character, the book is liike a canoe ride down the river in Deliverance. It will make you squeal like a pig!

Can't get much better than this Woodrell guy--not when it comes to fusing violence with country living. Dag nabbit, they just go together like spittle on a backy-chewin geezer's whiskers. Woodrell is somethin' fresh and mean and lonesome and true in the land of the hardboiled. He takes you down a crick with Doyle Redmond, his protagonist, all cozied up with 19-year old Niagra, the daughter of Doyle's big brother Smoke, and when them two drift down that flowing water, heat just naturally gets turned up. Cause Niagra has flames lickin' up her legs--her sexy red boots--and Doyle's first look at 'em does him in. He's hooked.

Smoke's woman, Big Annie, cottons to Doyle in a sisterly/motherly way since he's her beau's brother and also after her daughter. The four of them harvest their dope (i.e., marijuana) cash crop which a pack of nasties, the Dollys, try to weasel in on. Take over, in fact. And, yes, it is a backwoods legendary feudin' thing--the Redmonds vs. the Dollys. The noir-ness of the book is not just this feud; it's Doyle's and Smoke's tendencies to feel things in the extreme.

This is a great read cause Woodrell is a mighty fine writer. He knows how to sling the right words, blend them smooth as you please in an eminently readable way. Most entertaining. A genuine pleasure, if you ask me.

Pick it up and have a dang good time.

This guy is that good. Burke, Grisham, Norden, Hegwood, all you southern noir types go home. Woodrell is that good. This guy is a real writer's writer. A-1 on the jukebox and nowhere on the charts I guess. Give Us a Kiss displays a voice and style that harkens back to Faulkner, James M. Caine and Walker Percy. A true gem.

Why do truly creative writers like Woodrell get overshadowed by the mass market pap and hack writers? Woodrell tells great stories with original spins on what some might call stock pulp fiction characters in neat, compact books that his best selling contemporaries attempt to tell with less entertaining and often outright dull results and they do so in 300, 400+ pages! I read this book based on its subtitle and the slick jacket blurb. Holt knows to publish and package a good crime novel. I'm starting on Woodrell's earlier stuff now. He and John Straley are the two writers who deserve a lot more attention and a lot more readers.

As a fellow Hillbilly from Woodrell's neck of the woods, I can attest to the accuracy of everything the man says. Don't fool yourself, this may be listed as fiction, but I can take you to the exact spot...or a close enough facsimile. Great writing, and the best grasp on 'payback' I've seen since I dumped this feller off the bridge a few years ago. I'm proud to see another hillbilly made it out of the woods, proud to see he isn't above coming back. Good work, Dan. Might see you on the Big Piney, we'll kill us some lunch.

Goomer love, blood, sweat, and the shallow world of literary academia all come together in this delightful, sexy and deeply entertaining novel. On his way from "California to someplace where there aren't any bench-warrants" out on him, Woodrell's protagonist walks the line between "civility" and his hard-scrabble hill-billy roots. Fleeing his failed marriage and university politics, the siren-song of his native Ozarks calls him home to settle old debts and to incur some surprising new ones. A bang-up read in all senses of the word.

I loved this book. I've never read anything like it...it makes plain country folk cool. I'm glad I found another writer to add to my list of personal favorites.

I am a big fan of Mr Wodrell's work. In " Give Us a Kiss: A Country Noir"
Daniel Wodrell spins a fine dark tale.
The author has a talent for capturing the pulse of the underbelly of America. Outside of Richard Ford few writers are able to get in the skin
of these characters and speak as well.
I found myself laughing out loud as I read.

"Winter Bones" is my favorite Wodrell work.
"Give us a Kiss: A Country Noir" is worth the ride.
Jeff Rowlands

I read this in about two days in the Summer of 2001. I was 19 and working at a mall kiosk and was so engrossed in this book I barely realized I was at work. I still have it to this day.

There is a raw component to Woodrell's work that will speak to you. This book is a multi layered read consisting of part crime story, part love story and a generational glimpse of a part of cultural America.
Another aspect of this read is the difficulty to change from ones roots and what one could almost call karma or destiny.
I won't discuss the plot look elsewhere for that.
Highly recommended.