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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Strangely Satisfying Yet Confused Around The Edges, February 19, 2002
By A Customer
I could recommend this scrappy micro press novella for those seeking some trashy piecemeal restroom reading. Certainly not a a great book, but considering other music scene novels I've had the misfortune to own, it ain't half bad at times either. Based on the life of a (semi?)fictitious "indie" wannabe rock star named Cash Newman, the book is equal parts confusing and amusing. The narrative is a faux auto-boy-ography of a heroin using rock dude musician and makes a few vague references to real 80's & 90's "indie" bands, which can help set the timeframe involved. The author who obviously digs Bukowski, Burroughs and Bugs Bunny more than Kundera or Kant, supposedly spent his time actually commiting many of these antics. As a reformed "Newman", he now attempts to "Cash"-in and tell a tale of fear and loathing on the road to ruin. Although replete with plenty of drug addled escapades and oddball observations, it has some halfway witty banter and lotsa hard to imagine [these kind of] women. If it really is based on a true story, one wonders where you could find such an abundance of bizarre trollops. Prone to stilted sex scenes and spurts of silly dialogue, it's still got the basic goods to keep the reader's eyes open in small doses. It flows wildly at times, and at others congeals like literary molasses on it's agnst ridden way to test the attention span of those with little patience for pithy punk rockers in heat. The weak moral payoff at the end leaves a unique, complex story stuck somewhere between comical "cautionary tale" and loud horrifying jumble signifying ???.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I'm Not Hungry Anymore, March 13, 2004
There are lots of novels about sex and drugs, but I don't think the people who write them have done enough of either. Starving in the Company of Beautiful Women is written as fast and as sexy as its subject matter but doesn't try too hard.It's a first-hand narrative of Herion-infested, panty-swimming existance of musician, Cash Newmann. It's about love, beauty, ignorance, and ugly. And these topics are often touched within a few sentences of each other. Michael Dean has enough spunk (no pun intended)to take the english language to the next level. When words fail, he just makes a new one. I'm glad to have added "kittywhore" to my vocabulary since reading his book. I, like many of the women in the book, felt for Cash in his glimmering moments while still absolutely disgusted by his drugs-are-candy and women-are-bathtowels ideals. Was our hero truly a monster? All the more reason to turn the page. This decade is starving in the company of forced novels about addiction, lust, and power. Dean mercifully spoons us something substancial.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I was there!, November 21, 2007
This is somewhat fictional, somewhat history, and somewhat hallucinatory. I was there for all of them. I may be stuck there, I don't know. A great first effort that truly conveys punk rock life from a musician's perspective back before punk became a music industry flavor. Back when punk was an attitude not a category. This book oozes attitude.
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