Customer Reviews

The James Dean Affair: A Neil Gulliver and Stevie Marriner Novel (Neil Gulliver and Stevie Marriner Novels)

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

 

 

Every Hollywood insider including columnist Neil Gulliver and soap opera queen Stevie Mariner knew that the Rebel without a Cause teen idol was destined to be Elvis before Elvis. However, the giant screen star died in a fiery crash in 1955.

Stevie is going to perform at the Hollywood Post Office branch as part of the James Dean commemorative stamp celebration. During the gala event, a Dean look alike interrupts the proceedings by killing an actor who worked with Dean. Unable to resist their curiosity, the formerly married to one another, but still friendly couple, Neil and Stevie investigate the mysterious stranger. However, instead of a simple case, the evidence they find points to Dean not dying in the car crash and a conspiracy in progress for years that kills several of his film co-stars. Now the assailants target Neil and Stevie.

Robert S. Levinson uses his droll wit to provide readers with a humorous look at the seemingly surreal world of Hollywood. Stevie and Neil provide a charming and bickering duet that easily could have starred Lucy and Desi. Their relationship is cleverly intertwined to support the exciting story line of THE JAMES DEAN AFFAIR. The fast-paced plot makes filmdom seem darker and seedier than usual, but handled with a classy touch that enthralls the audience with the sub-culture and the mystery.

Harriet Klausner

While reading this novel, I found it intensifying. It had few flaws (such as the fact that the story would have been better off if it was based on a fictional Hollywood star rather than James Dean). However, it is funny, witty, and most of all thrilling. Everyones entitled to there own opinion however. But to me it is a pretty great book.

I've read all three books in this series, and while this is not my favorite of the three, it is still a far better read than much of what attempts to pass for reading material in today's throw-it-together publishing world.

Stevie and Neil remain fun, and the never ending action kept me turning the pages so that I wouldn't have to go to sleep without finding out what really happened.

You'll want to know too, I think, and like all series with developing characters it is a lot of fun to get to know them from the beginning.

"The James Dean Affair" is awful -- truly awful. Let me count the ways:

1) The plot is contrived. Its premise that James Dean is apparently alive and well and psychotic with a family of demented and murderous offspring home-based in Fairmount, Indiana is too preposterous to cause even dimwit readers to suspend their collective belief. Mr. Levinson tries to spice this tepid mess with frequent red herring climaxes and idiotic sidebars, such as a robery-rape attempt and a subsequent chase scene which have little bearing on anything, though the scene does give Stevie, the female protagonist, an opportunity to talk a bit slutty and titillate the reader.

2) In general, the prose is flat and repetitive. Mr. Levinson attempts to drape his deadwood in tinsel with frequent figures of speech which are supposed to convey showbiz glitz and glitter. For example, there is, "My heart was doing a rumba," and two or three pages later, "...my heart and head pounding like a drum duet by Gene Krupa and Buddy Rich." Oh please!

3)The stars of the show, Stevie and Neil, who are, of course, supposed to recall Nick and Nora Charles, are totally unappealing, as they hash and rehash the terms of their long-term dysfunctional relationship. Their IQs seem to be somewhere in the vicinity of 85 or 90, and they banter and coo in the most annoying ways. Their exchanges are filled with non-sequiturs and imbecilic illogic. In real life, I'd hate to do lunch with them.

4)The female lead, Stevie, is particularly loathsome. She's supposed to be a smart, independent woman, but throughout most of the novel she continually shows herself as totally vain, utterly stupid, and desperately clinging. In short, she's a real bimbo. Her quick wit is demonstrated early in the novel when, in a stoke of true Hollywood genius, she whips out her knockers in order to prevent further mayhem at a murder scene. Good thinking! One of her most annoying habits is her frequent mewing of the word "Daddy" to her paramour Neil. It appears that his bleating is supposed to indicate her need to be protected by her guy -- a very subtle psychological touch.

5) And, finally there is the obviously irritating intent of the novel to produce a sequel -- whether there is a demand or not. Maybe, Dennis Hopper will surface in the next one. He was conspicuously absent from the Dean clan's "A" list of film cronies-in-need-of-killing. Please spare Mr. Hopper the indignity.

Never have I been more tempted to contact an author directly to ask for my money back! If only it were possible to award a negative number of stars! I read -- on average -- four mystery paperbacks per week, everything from classic hardboiled to neo-cozies to regionals, and I have yet to slog my way through a muddier or more pointless story. Levinson's method for plugging a gaping plot hole or perking up a sagging storyline is to insert a burst of absurd and senseless violence. This novel would be a short story if all the characters weren't complete morons. The so-called "Tinseltown" nostalgia amounts to being cornered at a party by a boring drunk. Perhaps most annoying is the implication that Gulliver and Marriner are a latter day Nick and Nora Charles. Hardly! Gulliver and Marriner's dialog and their relationship have all the snap, sparkle and wit of a sack of wet sand. Presumably the ending is supposed to leave the reader concerned about the future of these two charmless amateurs and hungry to learn more about them. The only justification for their being a series of Gulliver and Marriner books is that someone at Tor wants Levinson's help getting a screenplay produced.

I enjoyed The Elvis and Marilyn Affair because of its interesting insights into the relationship between those two icons. Always having been fascinated with James Dean, naturally I looked forward to new insights from this book. Having only found a few pages like that, I was disappointed. If that's your reason for wanting to read this book, I suggest you go elsewhere.

Having committed to the book, I found that The James Dean Affair turns out to be a fantasy along the lines of Elvis still being alive . . . except this James Dean isn't anyone you'd want to meet. If you are a James Dean fan, you may actually find this story to be offensive.

If you decide to take the whole story with tongue in cheek, the book is an average satirical comedy about Hollywood. I'll review the book from that perspective.

Since James Dean died, his fellow actors haven't fared much better. Is it a curse? Or is someone out to get them? That's the book's premise.

The premise is defined when sexy soap opera star Stephanie ("Stevie") Marriner invites her ex-husband, Los Angeles columnist, Neil Gulliver, to a post office event to launch a new James Dean commemorative stamp. A murderous James Dean look-alike terrorizes the celebrities there and kills another actor from the Dean films. To smoke out the murderer, Neil writes an incendiary column about Dean that he doesn't intend to publish . . . but his nemesis editor, the Spider Woman, does so anyway. With a death threat on the voice mail, bullets are soon whizzing around Neil and Stevie.

As in The Elvis and Marilyn Affair, the couple finds more comfort in one another in the face of danger than they did during the last days of their kaput marriage. Much of the ironical humor comes from the development of their "can't live with each other, can't live without each other" relationship.

Much of the humor in the book is undercut by the extreme violence in the story. It's mostly pretty grisly and frightening, but it's annoying rather than compelling.

As for nostalgia, I enjoyed thinking about Rebel without a Cause and Giant again, as well as James Dean, Nick Adams, Sal Mineo, Natalie Wood, Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift and Marlon Brando. That was the most rewarding part of the book.

Be sure to heed this last piece of advice. Unless you really love this book, skip The John Lennon Affair (the next in the series) and go on to Hot Paint instead. Everything that's not to like in this book is even less lovable in The John Lennon Affair.

I thought the book was truley horrible. Although the summery seems exiting the book is terribly dull and makes James Dean out as a phsyco murderer.
Save your money, I wish i had