Late Ballard, a bit tired
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This was another book I read upon finishing my English Literature degree, eight years ago, for light relief. The fact that it was modern and that it was set in sunny Spain appealed to me, but the book didn't live up to my expectations. I'd found Empire of the Sun stuffy when I had read it at school, but I had liked Crash very much, thinking it in fact a masterpiece (a pleasant surprise after that dreadful film). But Cocaine Nights seemed a bit tired, without flashes of Ballard brilliance. Solid stuff, all the same, but unless you are an avid Ballard fan, there is better stuff out there worth spending your time on.
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No-brain nights
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After previously reading and being highly impressed by one of Ballad's other novels, 'High Rise', I was expecting great things from 'Cocaine nights'. In some ways this explores similar themes-a sort of barbarism hidden just below the surface of contemporary high-tech life, just waiting for a trigger to reveal itself. The trigger in this case, is an act of arson which ends several lives, and which the main characters brother inexplicably claims responsibility for.
An intriguing premise perhaps, but it is let down by a pedestrian writing style, an uninvolving storyline and two dimensional characters who dont talk like anybody in real life ever does.
One of the things I found most aggravating was the constant use of clumsy similes, often seeming to be placed at every other page, ('white walled retirement complexes marooned like icebergs among the golf courses'...'I waved the smoke aside, a swirling wraith released from his lungs'). Its as if Ballard subbed his writing duties to an earnest sixth former.
The unconvincing dialog might be acceptable if there was some hightened surreal reality being portrayed, as in 'High Rise', but the reality here is dull and predictable.
I struggled to finish it. A real disappointment. Looking at the other reviews, I can see opinion is somewhat polarized, so you may enjoy it. But there are far better books out there, and 'High Rise' is one of them.
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Inaccessably Snobby
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You're on holiday. You've just finished reading 'Invisible Monsters' for the fifth time, and decide you might try something from an author with a completely different prception and style of writing. You choose 'Cocaine Nights', expecting a thrilling, fast-paced literature from one of 'Modern Britain's greatest writers.'
You were wrong.
The first page; boring. You carry on, thinking it's just a bit of a change from ol' Chuck, and that sooner or later, you'll break through the text.
You were wrong.
This book is poor. Not quite awful, just poor. The characters are flat, and make you feel as if Ballard has never actually spoken to anyone outside of his socio-economic class. Everyone appears to be upper-middle class in this book, and this alone makes the novel completely inaccessible to anyone who doesn't live in a 6 bedroom, Georgian-period town house, to anyone who doesn't know how to use a fish fork, to anyone who's ever enjoyed their dinner whilst 'Coronation Street' plays nonchalantly in the background.
The descriptions are agrivatingly pin-pointed, and the entirety of the prose appears to be written by sombody lacking peripheral vision. Imagine reading a 14 year-old's attempt at a story, where nothing really binds and consistency is a mythological creature.
The whole book feels like a long Jonathon Creek episode, where every little mannerism is quintessentialy British, and worthy of a long, painful cringe. How coincidental that J.G. Ballard writes of Gibralta which, much like his writing style, is an embarrasing example of Brits clinging on to what was once so great and powerful.
I'd be thrilled for somebody to dare me to better Ballard.
I have a confident smile on my face when i say the old man could learn a thing or two.
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Violence as recreation...
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This is an interesting novel that melds one of Ballard's warning fables of the near-future with a whodunnit mystery, as a man tries to find out why his brother is pleading guilty to the charge of killing five people, when everyone is sure of his innocence. It's interesting and strange, but the novel doesn't quite succeed as well as it might though - Ballard's ideas on a future society of idle zombies and the shocking methods needed to 'wake them up' are disturbingly compelling, and the whodunnit mystery is at least initially intruiging, but the novel never quite gells into a satisfying whole. Still, an interestingly bizarre scenario, though Ballard would mine similar territory more succesfully in his next novel Super-Cannes.
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Flags a little towards the end...
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I finished this book today - this is my first J.G.Ballard novel. He is clearly a brilliant writer - his use of language and descriptions are first class.
I did generally enjoy the book, but felt that it flagged a little towards the end when I was getting a bit bored of it. As other reviewers have said, it is basically a "whodunnit" that is drawn out too long. The main character, Charles Prentice, gets drawn into a world of crime by the local wide boy, Bobby Crawford. However, the seduction of Charles by Bobby seems a little jarring and didn't quite flow in the narrative of the book.
Come the end of the book, because I was getting bored of it, I felt strangely unsatisfied, and yet the first half of the book was scintillating.
Ballard appears to be a prolific writer so hopefully I can find a better book of his to read that I'm sure I would enjoy more.
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