Country: USA
Genre: Literary/Noir
Pages: 122
This is not your usual novel. Heck, this is not your usual anything. Jim Thompson had a real knack to produce literary UFOs. The Alcoholics was published one year before Roughneck (his semi-autobiography) and it's even weirder. Fortunately, it's a lot better too. It's an extremely short reflection on alcoholism and the type of person who end up in a private clinic for this great ill of the soul. Thompson plays with a wide range of tones and emotions over such few pages. It's noir-ish because it's about no-good underachievers with a sword of Damocles over their head and having to deal with dubious moral choices. Yet it's literary because Thompson addresses their fragility. You can't really pinpoint a category for The Alcoholics, but it's a swift and powerful reading that will strangely resonate through you on multiple levels. It stays with you like novella usually don't. If you're looking to try Thompson and don't want to commit to something long, it's a good choice as long as you're not really into crime fiction.
The head of El Healtho clinic for alcoholics is Dr. Peter S. Murphy. He's a troubled individual with a shadowy past and his clinic (that he also qualifies of sanatorium) is the end of the line for him. He has a difficult time dealing with himself and yet he has to keep his clinic afloat. Despite having a strong sense of ethics, he needs to find fifteen thousand bucks pretty quick and the only way he finds of doing this is accepting to host the degenerate son of a wealthy family who just got himself a pre-frontal lobotomy. According to the reports, he becomes psychotic and proprietorial around alcohol. So The Alcoholics portrays the life in El Healtho after the check-in of their special client. Madness is slowly creeping into their lives at their are struggling with their addiction.
The Alcoholics has a bad reputation. Many Jim Thompson fans consider him to be a hit-or-miss writer and put this small novella in the miss section without a second thought. I heard said that it wouldn't even be in print if it didn't wear Thompson's name. I disagree. I liked The Alcoholics. I wouldn't read it times and times again, but I would come back to it. My best guess why people dislike it is that it looks like the first half of a longer novel. You have the elements for a worst case scenario to happen, but it doesn't. All you get are characters who struggle with a visceral thirst and a dignity that keeps eluding them like a muse. There are a few passages about alcoholism that are as beautiful as any passage in literature. The best passages of The Alcoholics are quiet moments of introspection. From the king of noir, it might be something hard to swallow.
But it's not a masterpiece. The Alcoholics has its moments of brilliance, but it's too short and has too many characters to make you care deeply about their fate. I don't have the book with me as I'm writing this review and the only two names I can remember from the book are those of Doc Murphy and Lucretia Baker. My best guss is that the guests of El Healtho clinics are offsprings of Jim Thompson's own alcoholism. The man was a notorious drunk and The Alcoholics was written young enough for him to have been somewhat of a quest for his own cure. Doc Murphy is a solid character, but the reader's attention keeps bouncing all over the place. I liked it. I wouldn't bring it on a desert island, but The Alcoholics worked its number on me. I don't think it was meant to say much, but what it said, it said properly. If you're not into noir and are looking to dip your toes, it might be for you. It might also be for the longtime Thompson fans who are just looking for a different kind of novel. The Alcoholics is worth your time and attention. It's also frank and different enough to demand a clear opinion. I liked it. It's an honest, beautiful take on the lows of alcoholism, despite being highly unfocused.
The head of El Healtho clinic for alcoholics is Dr. Peter S. Murphy. He's a troubled individual with a shadowy past and his clinic (that he also qualifies of sanatorium) is the end of the line for him. He has a difficult time dealing with himself and yet he has to keep his clinic afloat. Despite having a strong sense of ethics, he needs to find fifteen thousand bucks pretty quick and the only way he finds of doing this is accepting to host the degenerate son of a wealthy family who just got himself a pre-frontal lobotomy. According to the reports, he becomes psychotic and proprietorial around alcohol. So The Alcoholics portrays the life in El Healtho after the check-in of their special client. Madness is slowly creeping into their lives at their are struggling with their addiction.
The Alcoholics has a bad reputation. Many Jim Thompson fans consider him to be a hit-or-miss writer and put this small novella in the miss section without a second thought. I heard said that it wouldn't even be in print if it didn't wear Thompson's name. I disagree. I liked The Alcoholics. I wouldn't read it times and times again, but I would come back to it. My best guess why people dislike it is that it looks like the first half of a longer novel. You have the elements for a worst case scenario to happen, but it doesn't. All you get are characters who struggle with a visceral thirst and a dignity that keeps eluding them like a muse. There are a few passages about alcoholism that are as beautiful as any passage in literature. The best passages of The Alcoholics are quiet moments of introspection. From the king of noir, it might be something hard to swallow.
But it's not a masterpiece. The Alcoholics has its moments of brilliance, but it's too short and has too many characters to make you care deeply about their fate. I don't have the book with me as I'm writing this review and the only two names I can remember from the book are those of Doc Murphy and Lucretia Baker. My best guss is that the guests of El Healtho clinics are offsprings of Jim Thompson's own alcoholism. The man was a notorious drunk and The Alcoholics was written young enough for him to have been somewhat of a quest for his own cure. Doc Murphy is a solid character, but the reader's attention keeps bouncing all over the place. I liked it. I wouldn't bring it on a desert island, but The Alcoholics worked its number on me. I don't think it was meant to say much, but what it said, it said properly. If you're not into noir and are looking to dip your toes, it might be for you. It might also be for the longtime Thompson fans who are just looking for a different kind of novel. The Alcoholics is worth your time and attention. It's also frank and different enough to demand a clear opinion. I liked it. It's an honest, beautiful take on the lows of alcoholism, despite being highly unfocused.