Stark still carries all kinds of baggage from his more god-sized adventures, and his circle of lovers, confidantes and frenemies has gotten more complicated. That's not to say Killing Pretty is a cakewalk.

The series has been downscaled, and it's better for it. From here on out, Stark will work as an actual supernatural private eye, taking on cases in the grimy, borderline dystopian streets of LA. Kadrey's cleared away the mythological overgrowth that had begun to crowd Sandman Slim after six books, and he's replaced it with a leaner (and somehow even meaner) modus operandi. The seventh book in the Sandman Slim series, Killing Pretty, comes out next week, and it's a new page for Stark. And more often than not, those wisecracks exude an actual - if damaged - wisdom. Even when he's throat-punching angels or perched on the lip of a cosmic apocalypse, his quips, putdowns and observational zingers cut to the bone. Oh, and Stark has saved the world - make that the universe - without thanks or recognition.īook Reviews Back To The Future - The Grim, Grimy, Chrome-Coated Futureīeneath all those layers upon layers of braggadocio and nihilism lies the bleakest comedian in the world. He hangs out at the coolest bar in the world, Bamboo House of Dolls, a tiki-themed punk dive in his native LA that acts as the Mos Eisley Cantina for Kadrey's twisted vision of the supernatural underworld. He owns a video store called Max Overdrive that has recently begun selling magically procured versions of films that never came to be, like David Lynch's version of Return of the Jedi. He spent years in Hell, fighting demons in the Devil's own gladiator pits. But it also had brains, guts and a deliciously blackened heart.Īcross six novels, James Stark, aka Sandman Slim - a self-described 'mangy nephilim' - has wormed his way into my flimsy excuse for a soul. It boasted all the requisites of an urban fantasy: Magic, demons, vampires and a half-human/half-angel protagonist. But Sandman Slim instantly gripped me in a way no other urban fantasy had. Granted, Kadrey wasn't the first to do this Jim Butcher's massively popular Dresden Files series helped pave the way a few years earlier. It was urban fantasy mixed with hard-boiled detective fiction. Unlike Metrophage, though, Sandman Slim wasn't cyberpunk. Turns out Kadrey wrote Metrophage - a book I'd heard about but never actually got around to reading - back in the '80s, during the golden age of cyberpunk. Six years ago I picked up a book called Sandman Slim by an author, Richard Kadrey, whose name was only vaguely familiar to me. Your purchase helps support NPR programming. Close overlay Buy Featured Book Title Killing Pretty Author Richard Kadrey

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