Aug 21 2008
What Happens In Vegas…
What happens in Vegas, sucks. Seriously. The sequins, the sand, the dead bodies (I watch a lot of CSI), the cigarette smoke. Carrot Top. My overpriced timeshare. And, predictably, out of the muck and mire has come great inspiration, and not just CSI and Ocean’s Eleven. There’s other stuff that totally escapes me now that I started this riff, but it’ll come to you…Brand new on that list is a debut novel by Joe McGinniss, Jr., The Delivery Man. Think of Joe, Jr. as, maybe, the Bret Easton Ellis of Las Vegas–but don’t think about it too long, since he’s almost 40 and lives in D.C. with his wife and kids. Planned obsolescence in literary allusion: how cool is that?So they say, when copyright infringement isn’t an issue, that things that happen in Vegas stay in Vegas. For Chase, the protagonist of The Delivery Man, this concept resonates on a variety of levels. First of all, a lot has happened. Despite growing older, graduating college, and moving to New York City, Chase somehow finds himself back in Vegas, enmeshed with high school friends and high school habits, relationships like crime scene photos that rattle around in his head, that draw him in, that he can’t quite decide his part in. What used to be kids on the edge cutting classes to have some twisted idea of fun has evolved into a profession during his time away. Chase didn’t like it then, he doesn’t want it now, but he’s addicted. Not to the simple stuff that everyone else around him is jonesing for–drugs, sex–some complicated mix, or maybe it’s just where he comes from. But whatever happens in Vegas–and a lot seems to happen–will Chase stay in Vegas? There are moments when this book will make your skin crawl, but it’s a great read and an impressive debut.
