Customer Reviews

No Room for Squares

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I purchased Orlando Lima's "No Room For Squares" in the hopes of discovering a new and exciting voice finally presenting jazz fiction set in the world of today and not in the music's commercial heyday. To my supreme disappointment, the novel turned out to be poorly written, banal, derivative and strangely misogynistic. Mr. Lima's protagonist (nick-named Gamble) is a jazz trumpet prodigy chafing under the pressures of a career in high finance and who, in a moment of professional crisis and literary cliche, quits his job to rehabilitate his jazz chops in New Orleans. Various love interests that occupy several subplots--include a cloying girlfriend, an exotic dancer/mystic, and a generic vamp--are nothing more than one-dimensional objects of Gamble's exploitation and derision. Love scenes are described with the poetry of a medical anatomy textbook, and the few scenes devoted to the music are shockingly perfunctory and lacking in descriptive flourish.
Lima's grasp of jazz musician culture is tenuous; the dialogue uttered by his characters bears no resemblance to jazz "slang" of this or any era. He attempts to shift the narrative from Gamble to two of his cadre of supporters, a device used to a much greater effect in "The Horn," the wonderful and highly recommended beat/jazz novel by John Clellon Holmes. For all the "research" Lima conducted on Bourbon Street, he has one of the narrators, a New Orleans drummer, communicate in a grotesque caricature of a Creole patois formed by simply replacing the terminal consonant of each word with an apostrophe. After a final string of cliches (conflict with the girlfriend, one-upsmanship of a tragically unhip classical musician), the novel comes to a merciful ending.
The wait for a contemporary voice in jazz fiction continues.

Lima's first novel? I find that hard to believe. He writes engaging dialogue and develops interesting characters in a way writers twice as experienced can't duplicate. My one complaint is the number of copy editing mistakes. Otherwise, a great first novel. Looking forward to a lot more by this young writer.

No Room for Squares hits on that essential question we all must encounter in life--just what we want to do with that life. But like all great books, this one doesn't worry itself about coming to any grand conclusion, no resounding summation. Instead, Lima gets down to telling a story, and he's roped a darn solid one. This is an impressive first novel, one with pace and energy that drives the story forward and through what turns out to be a highly accessible read. There are gems here packed throughout, and even though this story makes no pretensions to being some kind of life's handbook, you will certainly recognize a moment or two of life's genuine shade. You were looking for something else?

Great reading! Lima smartly conveys a universal struggle to find the strength to be true to your dreams or accept the more comfortable path

Lima captures the mixed blessings of being a young professional in the 21st Century. Struggling to strike a balance between money, success, creative outlet, and personal freedom, the main character looks himself in the mirror and makes the difficult, life-altering decisions that so many of us dread. No Room is readable, fluidly musical, and at times just plain hilarious.

This is a fantastic book, especially for readers in their twenties and thirties searching for clues and answers to life's most irritating and important questions. It's also a great read for jazz fans, young and old. Excellently written dialogue, perfect prose. You won't be disappointed. Spread the word!

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. Lima is clearly a true jazz fan and I think it's particularly apparent in the rhythm of the narrative and the flow of his dialogue. It has that natural feel of a great improvisation rather than the awkward vibe of choreographed lines that writer's sometimes use to make a point through the mouth of their characters. The strength of the novel resides in the humanity of the characters and the vivid, colorful descriptions of their surroundings and exploits. It made me more interested in how those exploits went down than where they led. As a musician, I particularly enjoyed his descriptions of music throughout the novel, some of the best I've read. I could hear the notes shimmering out of the trumpet and imagine the melodies being played, even ones I'd never heard before.

This was a classic story of leaving the comforts of a day-to-day life for the love of a dream. Lima has a great and unique style of writing to cleverly use characters and circumstances to not only relay a compelling story but also touch emotions that we all struggle with everyday.

Lima has created a thoroughly enjoyable debut novel. The characters are full-bodied and the plot progresses assuredly and provocatively. Most enjoyable is Lima's evocation of the New York and New Orleans settings. The Lower East Side sparkles with its hard-edged night-life; the Latin Quarter shimmers with its sensuous, often stifling heat. From the bonds of friendship that the protagonist makes or breaks with his eccentric group of friends, to the strides towards manhood and passion he learns to take, to the triumphant, moving ending, NO ROOM FOR SQUARES is a gem of a novel.