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Sandman Slim: A Novel by [Richard Kadrey]

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Richard Kadrey

Sandman Slim: A Novel Kindle Edition

by Richard Kadrey (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

1,552 ratings

Book 1 of 12: Sandman Slim

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“An addictively satisfying, deeply amusing, dirty-ass masterpiece.”
—William Gibson

“A sharp-edged urban fantasy, drenched in blood and cynicism, tipping its hat to Sam Peckinpah, Raymond Chandler, and the anti-heroes of Hong Kong cinema….A bravura performance.”
—San Francisco Chronicle

“I couldn’t put it down.”
—Charlaine Harris

Sandman Slim has arrived—a wild and weird, edge-of-your-seat supernatural roller-coaster rider that propels author Richard Kadrey to the forefront of the fantasy, thriller, and a host of other literary genres. This spellbinding, utterly remarkable tale of a vengeful magician/hitman’s return from hell is part H.P. Lovecraft, part Christopher Moore, part Jim Butcher, and totally, unabashedly dark, twisted, and hilarious.

Print length

404 pages
Language

English
Publisher

HarperCollins e-books
Publication date

January 8, 2010
File size

2265 KB
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Kadrey (Butcher Bird) provides biting humor, an over-the-top antihero and a rich stew of metaphoric language in this testosterone- and adrenaline-charged noir thriller. James Stark spent 11 years killing monsters in Lucifer's arena for the entertainment of fallen angels, but now he's back in seedy, magic-riddled L.A., trying to avenge his girlfriend's murder and hunt down Mason Faim, the black magician responsible for getting him sent downtown. He meets with some initial success, beheading second-rate magician Kasabian (whose head becomes Stark's smart-mouthed sidekick), but he can't find Faim. Instead he encounters Homeland Security agents, a near-psychotic angel and some odd nonhuman, nonangelic beings called the kissi. Darkly atmospheric settings, such as a posh gentlemen's club where angels are tortured in an attempt to bring about Armageddon, bring this violent fantasy into sharp, compelling focus. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“The most hard-boiled piece of supernatural fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. … all confident and energetic and fresh and angry. I loved this book and all its screwed-up people.”

From the Back Cover

Supernatural fantasy has a new antihero

Life sucks, and then you die. Or, if you're James Stark, you spend eleven years in Hell as a hitman before finally escaping, only to land back in the hell-on-earth that is Los Angeles.

Now Stark's back, and ready for revenge. And absolution, and maybe even love. But when his first stop saddles him with an abusive talking head, Stark discovers that the road to absolution and revenge is much longer than you'd expect, and both Heaven and Hell have their own ideas for his future.

Resurrection sucks. Saving the world is worse.

Darkly twisted, irreverent, and completely hilarious, Sandman Slim is the breakthrough novel by an acclaimed author.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“If Simon R. Green wrote an episode of Dog the Bounty Hunter, it would read much like Sandman Slim – violent, vivid, non-stop action of the supernatural kind. I couldn’t put it down.” (Charlaine Harris )

“Nicotine and octane in equal parts might come close to the high-energy buzz from Richard Kadrey’s Sandman Slim. Crisp world building, recognizable and fully-realized characters, and a refreshingly unique storytelling style make for an absorbing read.Sandman Slim is my kind of hero.” (Kim Harrison )

“The most hard-boiled piece of supernatural fiction I’ve ever had the pleasure of reading. … all confident and energetic and fresh and angry. I loved this book and all its screwed-up people.” (Cory Doctorow, author of Little Brother )

“Paced like greased lightning (watch out for friction burns on your turning finger), blend the movie-ish delights of tough guy noir and such smart-mouthgore-fests as “Reanimator” and “Army of Darkness”, seasoned by soupcons of Gaimanian romanticism and Koontzian sentiment.” (Booklist )

“Sarcastic, irreverent and ridiculously enjoyable riff on the Urban Fantasy genre. … a lot like a mosh pit -- rough, exuberant, unpredictable -- and a heck of a lot of fun.” (Miami Herald )

“The best B movie I’ve read in at least twenty years. An addictively satisfying, deeply amusing, dirty-ass masterpiece, Sandman Slim swerves hell-bent through our culture’s impacted gridlock of genres…it’s like watching Sergio Leone and Clive Barker co-direct from a script by Jim Thompson and S. Clay Wilson.” (William Gibson ) --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From AudioFile

James Stark, magician and antihero of sorts, returns to the human realm after 11 years in hell--literally, not metaphorically. He returns as a "flesh and bone, armor-plated Dirty Harry" hit man who seeks revenge against the six people responsible for his entrapment there. MacLeod Andrews's performance infuses subtle energy into this urban fantasy, which is full of black magic and black humor. His crisp pronunciation and swaggering tone perfectly capture the noir tone of the novel. Andrews flawlessly shifts between various accents (he plays a 200-year-old Frenchman, for example) and character personas--from petty criminals and crime bosses to supernatural beings. The combination of Andrews's vocals and Kadrey's storytelling skills should satisfy and amuse. A.L.B. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Inside Flap

Supernatural fantasy has a new antihero

Life sucks and then you die. Or, if you're James Stark, you spend eleven years in Hell as a hitman before finally escaping, only to land back in the hell-on-earth that is Los Angeles.

Resurrection sucks. Saving the world is worse.

--Cory Doctorow, author of Little Brother --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

About the Author

Richard Kadrey has published five novels, including Sandman Slim, Butcher Bird, and Metrophage, as well as more than fifty stories. He has been immortalized as an action figure, and his short story “Goodbye Houston Street, Goodbye,” was nominated for a British Science Fiction Association Award. A freelance writer and photographer, he lives in San Francisco, California. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00338QF1E
Publisher ‏ : ‎ HarperCollins e-books; Reissue edition (January 8, 2010)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 8, 2010
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2265 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 404 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #105,875 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #191 in Horror Comedy
- #192 in Humorous Dark Comedy
- #520 in U.S. Horror Fiction

Customer Reviews:
1,552 ratings

About the author

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Richard Kadrey

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Richard Kadrey is a writer living in San Francisco. He is the author of dozens of stories, plus five novels, including Metrophage and Butcher Bird. His Wired magazine cover story, "Carbon Copy," was made into one of the worst movies of 2001. It starred Bridget Fonda. Sorry, Bridget.

Kadrey created and wrote the Vertigo comics miniseries Accelerate, which was illustrated by the Pander Brothers. He plans to do more comic work in the near future.

He is written and spoken about art, culture, and technology for Wired, The San Francisco Chronicle, Discovery Online, The Site, SXSW, and Wired for Sex on the G4 cable network.

He is also a fetish photographer.

He has no qualifications for anything he does.

Customer reviews

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4 star		26%
3 star		10%
2 star		3%
1 star		2%

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Top reviews from the United States

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The Choosy MooseTop Contributor: Photography

Interesting Book, Annoying Protagonist

Reviewed in the United States on August 1, 2016

Verified Purchase

This is a hard series for me to review. The author is good at writing, but he decided to make his protagonist completely unlikable. I like urban fantasy and anti-heroes, but I'm pretty sure Slim goes out of his way to be the biggest jerk possible. There's a difference between not being a goody-two shoes/being a mercenary and trying to pretty much actively kick every puppy you can on your way down the street. I know that Slim has had a screwed up life, but he spends most of the book being angsty and ridiculously self-destructive.

Also, his powers are pretty much completely broken and the only thing keeping him in check is the fact that Kadrey never puts any sort of reasonable power system into the whole series of books. Things just "magically" work or don't depending on where the plot is supposed to go and this is probably my biggest gripe with the series. It's not much fun to have a power system that's this broken, guns/knives/fire/power of old Gods all boils down to about the same level of danger for characters and are relatively interchangeable. Pretty much no one can actually die until the author suddenly lets them and then you have no idea why this one type of magic/attack worked where it has failed in past encounters.

And the world, don't even get me started on it. They live in this weird universe where there is technically a planet called Earth but apparently is populated by LA and nothing else. No one ever leaves LA nothing takes place outside LA. If they somehow manage to leave LA for some reason, they only go to an alternate plane that is alternate-LA and is almost exactly the same. It's pretty hard to care around a world this simplistic, especially when the author is nihilistic and seems to actively hate LA and makes every effort to make it sound like a pretty miserable place.

Finally, this book is a bit weird from a religious angle. The first book is pretty decent, but we soon find out that angels and demons are pretty wimpy all things concerned and neither are particularly good or evil. God is not holy, the devil is not evil and they aren't very powerful either. Everything is kind of mashed together in a nihilistic, bland stew. Some surprises or reversals are interesting, but Kadrey somehow managed to make supernatural beings boring and mundane.

Despite all this, I still generally enjoyed the books. Not sure how, but they might be worth a read if you can put up with the cons.

Background: I typically buy my Kindle books as part of the Kindle Daily Deals and plan them for airplane reading or times when I am away from home and cannot do more exciting or responsible tasks. This means that my standards are not too high and I am looking for books in the beach read category under the fantasy/sci-fi genres. I try to rate fairly on the star scale and personally consider anything 3 stars and up to be fine.

93 people found this helpful

Helpful

Kathryn Halbert

It was fine.

Reviewed in the United States on August 29, 2020

Verified Purchase

The bad guys betray the anti-hero, send him to hell, and kill his girlfriend. Now he's back and ready to mouth off and get some revenge. If that sounds good to you, then you'll probably be reasonably entertained. The problem for me was that it was fine, but lacking anything that would make it special. The side characters aren't especially memorable, and the big showdown didn't have me on the edge of my seat. I'm still not clear about how or why he became known as Sandman Slim and he doesn't seem to know either. He's got a rep, I got that, but why Sandman Slim? There are a few good lines, but the character spends a bit too long blundering about. Half the time he's an unstoppable badass, the other half he's getting his butt handed to him, sometimes by the same opponent. It's a bit inconsistent.

7 people found this helpful

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Caotico09

Plot Holes.

Reviewed in the United States on February 2, 2019

Verified Purchase

Sandman Slim is an interesting novel where the MC (Stark) isn't your stereotypical hero. Closer to an anti-hero, Stark is on a revenge campaign to hunt down the people that imprisoned him and murdered his girlfriend... and if he leaves a few bodies in his wake... well thats ok too.

Positive:
+ Characters. A demon fighting gladiator dropped onto the streets of LA, especially one that suffers from impulse control, make for an interesting novel.

Neutral:
+/- Writing. While including a large amount of internal thoughts and exposition, the writing was a-ok: it didn't impress or hinder the story.
+/- Tone. While i liked the general Noir/Anti-Hero tone that permeated most of the novel, the book sometimes became sidetracked. At these points it felt odd and misplaced.

Negative:
- Plot Scope = Plot Holes. Numerous instances early in the book where characters know things they shouldn't. Later in the book the plot goes from 'revenge-plot' to a 'world-ending-conspiracy-plot'. The transition wasn't handled great. The 'villain' details and information feel rushed and poorly fleshed out.

10 people found this helpful

Helpful

Reinold F.

A magical and dark journey to a never seen L.A.

Reviewed in the United States on August 2, 2018

Verified Purchase

This book is full of ridiculous characters: the protagonist is the baddest in a cosmic scale as a noir detective mixed with a war veteran and a gladiator; everybody seems angry and even the considered good people actually does illegal or criminal things. And it is not only the characters: the plot also gets uncontrolled from something supernatural to pure mythology. So I couldn't say I like it... I love it! xD it was quite fun and I found myself seeing what more was happening to the struggle of our hero to avoid the closing of... Max Overdrive Video 😂😂

Among the things I loved more was to read the thoughts of Sandman Slim about anything, specially about L.A. Los Angeles is a city that I know from movies an it is a kind of magic place so his point of view is fantastic as he seen it as if it was the first time: he is exploring L.A. with us. Without spoiling the story one of the most amazing parts is the trip to the famous Bradbury Building (if you are fan of Blade Runner you know this building) that turns an already spectacular place into something eerie and magical, specially I felt what I felt when I read Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth.

7 people found this helpful

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Kindle Customer

Obviously a polarizing book, but I am hooked.

Reviewed in the United States on November 27, 2021

Verified Purchase

I've read extremely positive reviews and extremely negative reviews of this one book. This is what kept me from reading it for years. A recent deal on the eleventh book in this series did what deals on later books in a series always do. It pi$$ed me off and caused me to buy the first book as well as the "sale" book and now several books between. I liked this protagonist immediately. He gets a little too whiny and pathetic some of the time but his self loathing and his struggle are real. The snarkiness isn't the same as that painted onto teenage girls in urban fantasy novels. This feels more organic, more real. Oddly, Stark makes me think of hard boiled noir detectives more than anything. Yes, I think I'll keep reading this series.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Shez

Don’t bother... save your money!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 23, 2019

Verified Purchase

Well what a disappointment. I’ve had this book in my wish list for ages waiting for the price to come down. And when it did I was so eager to read it after waiting all of that time. But after 92 pages I gave up! And if I could have my 99p back, I would. It was that bad. I don’t usually give 1 star reviews but I was so disappointed with this book. The story is very disjointed. It flits all over the place. One minute we’re taking to other characters and the next he’s reminiscing about Hell. The grammar and proof reading is really bad. And what finally did it was speech marks starting and then not ending. So I wasn’t sure whether he was talking to another character or just telling the story. After waiting for so long for this book, I was not happy that I had to give it up...something I very very rarely do. One thing that is good about it - at least I got it on a deal and didn’t have to pay its full original price.

Aspidistra

As subtle as an enchanted, sawn off shotgun

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on June 20, 2017

Verified Purchase

If you bundle Jack Reacher up with John Constantine and give him the hide of a rhinocerous, you might end up with someone like James Stark, AKA Sandman Slim, recently escaped after 11 tough years in Hell. What follows is a bullet riddled, gore splattered, revenge tale as Stark indulges in a murderous vendetta against those who sent him "Downunder" and killed his lover.

Sandman Slim is a not particularly original but entertainingly written, pure comic book action from beginning to end. As such, it's not going to be everybody's cup of tea. Don't read if you are looking for romance, fairies or subtlety. Do read if you like sardonic, violent anti-heroes, wanton destruction and supernatural horror reference spotting.

5 people found this helpful

Escapades of a Bookworm

Despite some flaws is an enjoyable roller-coaster ride

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 5, 2015

Verified Purchase

he opening chapter throws you straight into the story, with the reader having no time to grasp what is occurring.

Stark is throw into the cosmic battleground, where there appears to be no good guys (the Angels do not come across as particularly angelic).

The book is written in the first person so we know what is going on in Stark’s head. The narrative tone is full of dark humour, sarcasm and conveys someone who is a bit full of himself; Stark allows his mouth to get him into trouble, as he normally speaks before he thinks. Despite this Stark is a likeable character. While we know Stark is not evil (despite what the Angels say), we see that he has his own crooked moral code – save his friends and seek revenge.

For me there were two flaws in this the book. The first was the use of Alice (Stark’s love interest before he ended up in hell), we never see the type of character she was or what Alice and Stark really shared. Instead she comes across as a device used by Kadrey so that we can sympathise more with Stark and see him as a flawed hero rather than a virtuous villain. The second is where did the name Sandman Slim come from. Even the title character is confused over the name choice and we never receive a sufficient answer.

Despite these flaws, Sandman Slim was a thoroughly enjoyable book, and was from beginning to end a roller-coaster ride.

2 people found this helpful

justin webb

Sin city with hellfire free of charge

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 22, 2019

Verified Purchase

Sandman slim is written how he describes Maledictions. Which is to say a tyre fire inside a candystore.

If I now have your attention come in take a sit let's talk. If like me you have been following the trend of urban fantasy you maybe familiar with other authors and heros or antiheros in the series.

You may like Hellboy or Constantine. You may also be more familiar with books than comics. Ok so how about Harry Dresden, Anita Blake, Mercy Thompson and Nate Temple? If you have read one or more of these types of books then hopefully your still here as this is where it gets good.

Sandman slim isn't like the others, he is in your face he's angry and he isn't crying about his crabby day. Yes as a character he has flaws and makes mistakes but they are within his character not world breaking trying to string the book out.

I've recommended this series several times and no one I got to pick it up hasn't finished it or didn't want to talk about it or recommend it to others.

One person found this helpful

plot hound

Cheesy fun.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 13, 2016

Verified Purchase

This is a bit of a cliché-fest at times with the overly hard-bitten protagonist against a variety of dark forces. There is the past betrayal and guilt of a lost love and the get-out-of-jail-free card of special satanic magic.

The book often feel like a discount Hellblazer, Stark is similar to Constantine but lacks the humour of the better Hellblazer stories.

The plot is straight-forward, there are a few twists but the aren't very surprising since there are so many different back-stories etc being introduced that any plot device could be explained away.

It is clearly intended as the start of an open ended series, not a lot of depth or originality but some slightly gritty style, a guilty pleasure rather than anything special.

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