9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
MAMBO!, April 3, 2010
This review is from: Repo Men (Mass Market Paperback)
Read this book right after watching the movie and I think it's sad that so much from it appears to have been lost in the conversion. Yeah, only so much can be told in 100 minutes, but still.... The book's ending, and most of the story, is quite different from the movie. I personally prefer the ending of the book, but the one given to the movie is more... fitting, I suppose. Somehow, both stories seems to complement each other in a way.
"MAMBO", btw, is a reference to the structural style of the narration. It moves back and forth all the time, as if dancing, throwing around bits and pieces of the narrator's life story, sometimes seemingly at random. Seriously, this is NOT a poorly written book, on the contrary, a lot of not so obvious yet important details and several currently relevant subjects that inspire hard thinking were weaved into a well thought out story, but I see how the unconventional narrative style (which I have seen similarly used before in some Hispanic American novels) could be a little odd to some. IMO however it just created a really interesting, refreshing and entertaining read. Also, the book's fragmented structure is a reflection of how an ex-military turned Union Man (nameless in the book) sees everything, including people. To him there are only fragments and he's unable (and maybe a bit reluctant) to put those together and look at the whole. After all, he only came for your liver, who cares about the rest of you? ;)
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Awesome, May 22, 2011
This review is from: Repo Men (Mass Market Paperback)
I remember adding Eric Garcia to my authorial wishlist. Karin Slaughter was at the Melbourne Writers Festival, and talked of how she was more nitpicky of the locations in the Vincent Rubio series, when really she should've questioned the realism of a dinosaur going undercover in contemporary America. Dinosaurs, crime and humour? I was hooked. Those three books have been long out of print, though, so I've never acquired them.
I have, however, read MATCHSTICK MEN (which is okay) and CASSANDRA FRENCH'S FINISHING SCHOOL FOR BOYS (which is great). But Eric Garcia's crowning glory is this magnificent tome: THE REPOSSESSION MAMBO, later republished as REPO MEN. The premise is irresistible: people can have transplanted artificial organs, but if they don't keep up the payments, the artiforgs are repossessed.
Our unnamed narrator has been through five marriages and subsequent divorces, driven tanks in wartime Africa, and worked as a Bio-Repo man for the Credit Union. But now he's hiding out, writing his memoirs while he's still alive - which may not be for much longer.
Simply put, I adore this novel. I love the premise, the narrator's voice, the humour, the looping internal structure, the world-building, and even the romance. I'm not usually one for romance, but the ending totally made me coo, "Aw!" If I was a writer, I'd totally want to write something as awesome as this.
Be sure to stick around for the author's essay, THE TAMING OF THE MAMBO, which charts the twelve-year journey from idea to short story to novel to screenplay and back to novel. I haven't seen the film, REPO MEN, which unfortunately went straight to DVD in Australia, so I can't tell you how the book and film measure up against each other.
And no, I'm not familiar with REPO! THE GENETIC OPERA, so I can't talk comparisons, similarities and differences.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Repo Men, February 19, 2011
Simply Breathtaking. I saw the movie before readimg this and thought ehh there werent going to be any difrence but the book was easily the best book i ever read. It had the perfect blend of romance, comedy, and action. it was the perfect book in my opinion and this book is way under rated than it deserves.
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