John Schulian
Auteur de Xena Warrior Princess: Season 2
A propos de l'auteur
John Schulian, editor, was a sports columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times and Philadelphia Daily News before moving to Hollywood, where he was, among other things, the co-creator of Xena: Warrior Princess. With George Kimball, he co-edited the Library of America anthology At the Fights. He is the afficher plus author most recently of Sometimes They Even Shook Your Hand: Portraits of Champions Who Walked Among Us. afficher moins
Œuvres de John Schulian
Football: Great Writing About the National Sport: A Special Publication of The Library of America (2014) 41 exemplaires
The Great American Sports Page: A Century of Classic Columns from Ring Lardner to Sally Jenkins: A Library of America… (2019) 25 exemplaires
Twilight of the Long-ball Gods: Dispatches from the Disappearing Heart of Baseball (2005) 16 exemplaires
Sometimes They Even Shook Your Hand: Portraits of Champions Who Walked Among Us (2011) 10 exemplaires
Étiqueté
Partage des connaissances
- Date de naissance
- 1945-01-31
- Sexe
- male
- Nationalité
- USA
- Lieu de naissance
- Los Angeles, California, USA
Membres
Critiques
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Auteurs associés
Statistiques
- Œuvres
- 8
- Membres
- 150
- Popularité
- #138,700
- Évaluation
- 3.9
- Critiques
- 3
- ISBN
- 20
A multiple point-of-view story, the principal characters are Jenny Yee, a Korean college student earning tuition money in the massage business, Scott Crandall, a washed-up out-of-shape television actor whose main source of income is the massage business he owns, his would-be friend Onus DuPree, and Nick Pafko, a former boxer still haunted by the freak accident that killed an opponent when the poor sap hit the ropes exactly wrong.
Scott was glad to hire Jenny, as his last Asian girl was leaving, and in their business he needed someone to please the “rice chasers.” Meanwhile, her priority is a new job where there is someone to provide security. A string of vicious massage parlor robberies has made the women nervous. An out-of-work ex-boxer who will also keep the books sounds like just what Scott needs. Nick can’t quite get over being offended to be working in a jack shack, but it soon becomes obvious the girls need him.
Always playing the angles, Scott has no respect for the girls, for Nick, or, for that matter himself. “What a f--- town. Shake a tree and whores fell out of it. Whores and actors, like there was any difference between the two.” Scott is drifting into a closer orbit with his scary friend DuPree, putting everyone at increased risk—not from the cops or any of the other forces of order, but from the climate of violence DuPree creates, like a mountain making its own weather.
One thing about this book is you learn a whole new vocabulary [!] and a lot about a subculture of desperate young women. IRL erotic massage is estimated to be a $1 billion a year business in the United States, often involving immigrant women with few choices. The exploitation isn’t a surprise, nor is the potential for violence, but Schulian’s uncanny ability to get into the minds of these quite different individuals makes for a compelling read.
He comes by his skills honestly, with respect to character development and a driving storyline. Although this is his first novel, he has published short stories, and his main career has been as a Hollywood scriptwriter, working for television programs such as L.A. Law, Miami Vice, and JAGS. He co-created Xena: Warrior Princess—for a while the world’s foremost syndicated TV series. He has been a sports and magazine writer and has edited two anthologies of writing about boxing, which no doubt contributed to the authenticity of his character Nick’s voice.
The book title comes from a Patty Griffin song, “And I wonder where you are, And if the pain ends when you die, And I wonder if there was some better way to say goodbye.” A knockout.… (plus d'informations)