This is the BEST book I have ever read. I have reread it more than ten times since I was a teenager. Why? First, it does in one book what Patricia Cornwell, Susan Hill, and Dennis Lehane can do with all of their books combined. I have read hundreds of crime novels over the years. City of the Dead is the gold standard. There's nothing quite like it. Second, the story changes each time you reread it. Its urban setting breathes down your throat. The emotional undercurrents make you wince. It is intricate and ambitious. It is bleak and morbid. You "change" alongside the characters in the book. Third, this novel made me pick up everything by Lieberman. You might also want to try Crawlspace. Another one of his books, Nightbloom, is also quite good but not as powerful as City of the Dead. What comes close to Herbert Lieberman's artistic swagger is a Thomas Harris with the gritty sensationalist fervor of an Ira Levin. Here's a well-thought review by Cosma Shalizi. Shalizi articulated a common theme that was prevalent among the various commentary I'd read about Lieberman: that sadly little is known about Lieberman. There's only basic information on his wiki page. There's nothing on his Amazon author page. What prompted me to blog about this is the unending wake of the famous Fifty Shades of Grey, a book so badly written it made my eyes water with disgust. It's that bad. And I just had to see it, the same way some people like dangerous sports that involved cliffs and rappelling. I realized that books survive (or not) through the collective devotion (or the lack thereof) of their readers. That's what happened to the marvelous House of Leaves and its cult following. I hope Herbert Lieberman will develop a cult following. I think we should talk about our favorite books, our favorite writers. That way, they live on. Think The Neverending Story and Falkor (because I love Falkor). Almost 2AM here. Night.
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Best ever, huh? Okay, you got me. This is now on my TBR list right under Across the Universe by Beth Revis. I tried my hand at this genre around 2001, an endeavor that allowed me to add another epic failure to my ever-growing list. I'll be posting it on my "Novels" page as soon as I finish transcribing The Wellstone Chronicles.
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6/4/2012 03:18:04 am
It is, Jack! It was a toss-up against Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles as my all-time favorite book. But City of the Dead is just spectacular. I highly recommend it. This genre, I suppose, is very difficult to write. You'll never know, but you might end up trying your hand at it someday. Hmm, the Beth Revis book you've mentioned looks very interesting. It even has a fictional blueprint on Amazon!
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Hi, K! I have completed three fantasies, a "Jane Bond" type adventure, and a crime novel called Broken English. Of those genres, I found crime to be the most demanding, if not difficult, because it's such a spiderweb. The tiniest mid-stream alteration in the manuscript knocks everything else out of alignment, and leaves you facing hours, days, of going back, finding, and correcting a dozen plot points that suddenly make no sense any more. I knew before I finished my first one that it would be my last one...
Hi, Kristine. New business. Sorry to stray from topic, but Angelya at The Oaken Bookcase just posted about this, and I want to make sure my book-specific friends know about it. Take a look at www.armchairbea.com, and if it grabs you, jump in. My material roams a little far afield to get much out of this, but it might be right up your alley!
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6/5/2012 10:02:26 am
I'll check it out Jack! Thanks for the heads up.
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bruce bateman
6/29/2013 07:03:15 pm
i agree, i read this book around 1980 and found it very good and very disturbing. Herbert Lieberman is a very underrated author..
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