Reading 1001 discussion
This topic is about
Get Shorty
1001 book reviews
>
Get Shorty - Elmore Leonard
date
newest »
newest »
I rarely find Elmore Leonard's books super-memorable, and this was not an exception, but they are always fun, fast reads. I am not sure I'd have included this specific book on the List, but I enjoyed it. I gave this book 4 stars on Goodreads.
I didn't really enjoy this one and gave it 2 stars. Just subjectively speaking, gangster crimes and the the inner machinations of Hollywood are just two subjects I find it really hard to enjoy or care about. I've read 2 Elmore Leonard books now and just don't find there to be anything special about his writing either.
putting in my 2 cents worth.... read Dec. 2020, somehow I didn't post my review here?? I can only think that I didn't think it was on the list.....Even though it’s been about 25 years I remember the movie version of this book quite well. As a consequence, the whole time I was reading this I pictured Chili Palmer looking like John Travolta (playing Chili Palmer….). This added quite a bit to my enjoyment of this book. In fact, I found some of the novel kind of flat – not as good as I remember the movie being. There was no sense of attraction between Karen and Chili, yet they end up in bed. Leonard doesn’t really have many women in this novel and they are quite one-dimensional. There was definitely opportunity to flesh out their stories. I was surprised that there wasn’t a real ‘show-down’ between Chili and Bones, Leonard kept foreshadowing the possibility but it fizzled out.
It was obvious Leonard was skewering Hollywood types based on his experiences. That was amusing. Other than that, it was good, but not as good as it could have been. 3*
I enjoyed this crime fiction novel. A successful, likeable crook ends up in LA trailing a man who took off without paying his debt back in Miami. The crook, called Chili Palmer, goes to LA and meets up with Harry Zimm a film producer. He also becomes involved with Harry's "investors" and life gets a little tense. This book was fun and a fast read.