Duncan Delaney and the Cadillac of Doom

by A. L. Haskett
180 pages
Publisher: JonLin Books
ISBN: 096788330x


Library Thing Info

I wanted something fast and short to read to squeeze in before HP7 gets released. Found it

Duncan Delaney is a 21 year old young man who lives on his mother’s well to do ranch in Wyoming painting pictures of people on black velvet. One day his friend Benjamin sells one to a Hollywood art agent who invites him out to LA. So….he goes.

This book is OK. I mean really average. It has some good points to it, and really the poor points fall into two categories - bad and immature writing. Let’s start with the good news.

Duncan’s best friend Benjamin is almost worth compensating for the other short comings and weakness. This is a well defined, funny, wacky character. He is an Indian with a completely unhinged view of the world and a fierce loyalty to Duncan. Plus, he gets all of the good dialog.

The supporting cast of characters is also a fun bunch of weirdness. Sheila, the militaristic lesbian biker. Roscoe - the head-shaved, bike riding, leather vest tough guy, who is closeted gay. Sven - the giant Norse-god-like personal assistant. And the entire group of strippers from the Hollywood that are across the street from where Duncan sets up shop in LA (where is bus breaks down).

Now some of the weaknesses. The writing as a whole needed some rewrites. There are parts where the dialog is snappy, the plot is moving and the characters breathe, then there are others that are very flat and connective and very murky. Characters move and show up places and he does not mention it until some time into the scene. He seemed to know what was going on. Would have been nice if he told us. I think this falls into the immature writing side of things. This is his first book and published by a very small press. I am not sure how much editing and or cultivating it received. It shows.

Also, some of the things I really found poor were Duncan and Pris - the 2 main characters. While the support cast is wacky, quirky and overall good, the two main characters I found flat and overly gifted - be it in their talents or physical appearance.

On the note of physical appearance, it seems everyone of women in this book are exceptionally gorgeous, have large boobs and all of them want to be naked at one point. Seems like the writer is still 17 sometimes and can get grating. I also feel like I have given up some “man points” for complaining that there is too much talk of boobs.

What I found odd was the book is this off the wall romp type adventure and then gets, in my opinion, very heavy and takes itself far to seriously at the end. Really mismatched the whole story and we are left with a lot of side story left open (Benjamin - lots in the book, seems to not be part of it at the end). I expected more surrealism and weirdness as well. The car - the Cadillac of Doom - is such a minor point, I felt like it didn’t even matter, just made for a good title.

The whole time I was reading this, I felt like it was an early draft of a Christopher Moore book particularly, perhaps a Bill Fitzhugh book. Either way, it seemed like something that one of the two of them would write much better. I think overall, the writer has potential - it is there. The smart wit, the odd ball placement of stereotypes and odd settings but he needs to focus his writing chops some and mature his viewpoint and craft. I would consider reading other works, but with enough reservation that if the improvements were not what I would hope, then it would be time to move on.