No Good From a Corpse by Leigh Brackett
May. 23rd, 2006 08:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
randy_byersSo I finished this collection of Brackett's crime fiction last night. What I learned after a long, hard slog through over 500 pages is that I far prefer her science fiction. This may not be surprising, because I've never been a big fan of crime fiction. On the other hand, I really liked the two Dorothy B. Hughes crime novels I read relatively recently -- In a Lonely Place and Ride the Pink Horse -- so I'm not completely immune. I found these Brackett stories (and the eponymous novel that opens the collection) pretty flat, cliche, and uninvolving. Her SF is pretty cliche too, but the mood and exotic atmosphere pull me in. She's better at updating E.R. Burroughs than at updating R. Chandler.
Most of these stories were from early in her career, in the '40s, and her SF of that era wasn't as good as the stuff from the '50s. But the two or three stories from the '50s in this collection didn't impress me either. I'd still be willing to read one of the two crime novels she wrote in the '50s, but my expectations are definitely lowered.
Now I'm not sure whether to read some more of her SF novels or to go back and finish the CL Moore collection from the Fantasy Masterworks series (of which I've read the Northwest Smith stories but not the Jirel of Joiry ones). Decisions, decisions!
Most of these stories were from early in her career, in the '40s, and her SF of that era wasn't as good as the stuff from the '50s. But the two or three stories from the '50s in this collection didn't impress me either. I'd still be willing to read one of the two crime novels she wrote in the '50s, but my expectations are definitely lowered.
Now I'm not sure whether to read some more of her SF novels or to go back and finish the CL Moore collection from the Fantasy Masterworks series (of which I've read the Northwest Smith stories but not the Jirel of Joiry ones). Decisions, decisions!
