Recursion (Book)
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Recursion by Blake Crouch.
In a rash moment I picked up this book for 99p on Kindle. Blake Crouch, his publicity avers, is some new enfant terrible of Sci Fi: a Philip K. Dick for the twenty-first century. Since Crouch has apparently sold millions and is on top of the NY Times best seller, it won’t do him any harm if a nobody windbag takes his writing style to task, so herewith I will.
Recursion may indeed be breathtakingly imaginative sci-fi; it is so tediously written I doubt I will get far enough into it to find out. The writing is not bad as such: just loose. Wasteful. Flabby. Leaden. Amateur.
The JC gets the odd unsolicited manuscript from enthusiastic amateurs hoping for an Amazon review. They tend to suffer from the same kind of overwriting.
| Original Text | Rewrite | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Barry Sutton pulls over into the fire lane at the main entrance of the Poe Building, an Art Deco tower glowing white in the illumination of its exterior sconces. He climbs out of his Crown Vic, rushes across the sidewalk, and pushes through the revolving door into the lobby. | Barry Sutton locks up his Crown Vic and squeals it to a halt on the sidewalk outside an art deco meringue. The Poe Building glows under the glare of virgin sconces and thrusts skyward like some priapic, machine-age gorgon. Sutton checks his tie in the wing mirror. He mutters, “okay, Baz-boy, let’s rock this,” exits the sled, bolts through the Poe’s revolvers and barks: “POLICE! Hold that goddamn elevator!” |
Terrible first line, with far too much detail. Do we care that it is a fire lane, or the main and not some other entrance, or that Barry has arrived by car, or that it is a Crown Victoria? Unless he is in such a hurry to have squealed up, mounted the sidewalk and bounded out of his vehicle, leaving the door open to the ignored complaints of the doorman, we do not. But hey... I like that. The present tense is a constraining affectation, but let’s run with that. What kind of a name is Barry Sutton, by the way? |
| The night watchman is standing by the bank of elevators, holding one open as Barry hurries toward him, his shoes echoing off the marble. | The porter grunts and jabs a button. Sutton loafer-slides the last five yards of marble and hits the back wall. “Where’s the damsel at, Jerry?” The porter growls, “It’s Mike, dipshit. She’s on forty-one. Hang a right and keep walking.” The bell pings. The doors clam. The elevator surges. Sutton sniffs back a nose-bleed and preps his A-game. |
Flabby again. “Shoes echoing off the marble?” Please. |
| “What floor?” Barry asks as he steps into the elevator car. | What matters here is a suicidal lady dangling off a parapet the 41st floor. Other than conveying the idea that he’s in a hurry to get to her, there’s no real need for any of Barry’s arrival, exit from car, negotiation of revolving doors, conversation with the doorman, journey up the elevator or across the carpeted expanse of the Forty-first floor. These are extraneous paragraphs: they give the reader no important information and tell us nothing about the characters nor their states of mind. And much of it is just stupid. How does an elevator “belie the age of a building”? Who honestly gives a shit that Barry’s ears pop — at least make it a nose bleed! — or there’s a law firm’s office here, or that there is carpet on the floor? | |
| “Forty-one. When you get up there, take a right and go all the way down the hall.” | ||
| “More cops will be here in a minute. Tell them I said to hang back until I give a signal.” | ||
| The elevator races upward, belying the age of the building around it, and Barry’s ears pop after a few seconds. When the doors finally part, he moves past a sign for a law firm. There’s a light on here and there, but the floor stands mostly dark. He runs along the carpet, passing silent offices, a conference room, a break room, a library. The hallway finally opens into a reception area that’s paired with the largest office. | ||
| In the dim light, the details are all in shades of gray. A sprawling mahogany desk buried under files and paperwork. A circular table covered in notepads and mugs of cold, bitter-smelling coffee. A wet bar stocked exclusively with bottles of Macallan Rare. A glowing aquarium that hums on the far side of the room and contains a small shark and several tropical fish. | Forty-one is dark. Deserted. Sutton hangs right and makes for the single light source at the end of the hall. It opens onto a corner office war-room cluttered with the detritus of all-night deal-making: papers, markups, files, cold coffee. Everything but people. Sheer curtains billow, and then Sutton clocks it: the balcony door is open. He pads over. | “The details are all in shades of grey” is pretty dreary writing. Does cold coffee smell of anything, let alone bitterness? A small shark in a fish tank? Seriously? What relevance is the whisky? To point out wealth? Better to lead Barry out towards the deck. |
| As Barry approaches the French doors, he silences his phone and removes his shoes. Taking the handle, he eases the door open and slips out onto the terrace. | Barry sheds the loafers and slips out onto the terrace. | What is the obsession with shoes? Does it matter that his phone is on silent? Do we need to know about the handle? No. |
| The surrounding skyscrapers of the Upper West Side look mystical in their luminous shrouds of fog. The noise of the city is loud and close—car horns ricocheting between the buildings and distant ambulances racing toward some other tragedy. The pinnacle of the Poe Building is less than fifty feet above—a crown of glass and steel and gothic masonry. | The city sighs its usual song of tired tragedy: horns ricochet. Sirens wail. The Upper West Side skyscrapers loom mystically from luminous shrouds of fog. The Poe’s dazzling glass and steel pinnacle towers overhead. | I get it: trying to create a gothic mood and trying to stretch our literary wings here, but you need to do better, Blake. More active verbs, more agency, more presence. For God’s sake don’t be so lazy as to contrive a gothic image by using the adjective “gothic” (especially when you’ve already told us the building is Art Deco!) |
| The woman sits fifteen feet away beside an eroding gargoyle, her back to Barry, her legs dangling over the edge. He inches closer, the wet flagstones soaking through his socks. If he can get close enough without detection, he’ll drag her off the edge before she knows what— | She sits astride a broken gargoyle, her legs dangling over the city. She heaves deep, shaking sobs. | “She” works better than “a woman”, because it makes you wonder who. If her legs are over the edge, she must have her back to Barry. Again, the fixation with footwear. The reader knows what’s going on. Give us credit for not spooning it out. What she does and what he does should be different paragraphs. Break it out. Punctuate. |
| He moves toward her. She sobs. He steals another inch. She sobs. If he can just get close enough — | ||
| “I smell your cologne,” she says without looking back. | “I can smell your cologne,” she says, and sniffs. She does not look back. | Just tighten up a bit. |
| He stops. | Sutton freezes. She wracks another sob. |
Again, use the best word. There is drama here. It is tense. He’s creeping. “Freeze” conveys the drama. |
| Crouch’s original | The JC’s go |
|---|---|
Barry Sutton pulls over into the fire lane at the main entrance of the Poe Building, an Art Deco tower glowing white in the illumination of its exterior sconces. He climbs out of his Crown Vic, rushes across the sidewalk, and pushes through the revolving door into the lobby.
The night watchman is standing by the bank of elevators, holding one open as Barry hurries toward him, his shoes echoing off the marble. “What floor?” Barry asks as he steps into the elevator car. “Forty-one. When you get up there, take a right and go all the way down the hall.” “More cops will be here in a minute. Tell them I said to hang back until I give a signal.” The elevator races upward, belying the age of the building around it, and Barry’s ears pop after a few seconds. When the doors finally part, he moves past a sign for a law firm. There’s a light on here and there, but the floor stands mostly dark. He runs along the carpet, passing silent offices, a conference room, a break room, a library. The hallway finally opens into a reception area that’s paired with the largest office. In the dim light, the details are all in shades of gray. A sprawling mahogany desk buried under files and paperwork. A circular table covered in notepads and mugs of cold, bitter-smelling coffee. A wet bar stocked exclusively with bottles of Macallan Rare. A glowing aquarium that hums on the far side of the room and contains a small shark and several tropical fish. As Barry approaches the French doors, he silences his phone and removes his shoes. Taking the handle, he eases the door open and slips out onto the terrace. The surrounding skyscrapers of the Upper West Side look mystical in their luminous shrouds of fog. The noise of the city is loud and close—car horns ricocheting between the buildings and distant ambulances racing toward some other tragedy. The pinnacle of the Poe Building is less than fifty feet above—a crown of glass and steel and gothic masonry. The woman sits fifteen feet away beside an eroding gargoyle, her back to Barry, her legs dangling over the edge. He inches closer, the wet flagstones soaking through his socks. If he can get close enough without detection, he’ll drag her off the edge before she knows what— “I smell your cologne,” she says without looking back. He stops. |
Barry Sutton locks up his Crown Vic and squeals it to a halt on the sidewalk outside an art deco meringue.
The Poe Building glows under the glare of virgin sconces and thrusts skyward like some priapic, machine-age gorgon. Sutton checks his tie in the wing mirror. He mutters, “okay, Baz-boy, let’s rock this,” exits the sled, bolts through the Poe’s revolvers and barks: “POLICE! Hold that goddamn elevator!” The porter grunts and jabs a button. Sutton loafer-slides the last five yards of marble and hits the back wall. “Where’s the damsel at, Jerry?” The porter growls, “It’s Mike, dipshit. She’s on forty-one. Hang a right and keep walking.” The bell pings. The doors clam. The elevator surges. Sutton sniffs back a nose-bleed and preps his A-game. Forty-one is dark. Deserted. Sutton hangs right and makes for the single light source at the end of the hall. It opens onto a corner office war-room, cluttered with the detritus of all-night deal-making: papers, markups, files, cold coffee. Everything but people. Window-side sheer curtains billow, and Sutton clocks it: the balcony door is open. He pads over. Barry sheds the loafers and slips out onto the terrace. The city sighs its usual song of tired tragedy: horns ricochet. Sirens wail. The Upper West Side skyscrapers loom mystically from luminous shrouds of fog. The Poe’s dazzling glass and steel pinnacle towers overhead. She sits astride a broken gargoyle, her legs dangling over the city. She heaves deep, shaking sobs. He moves toward her. She sobs. He steals another inch. She sobs. If he can just get close enough — “I can smell your cologne,” she says, and sniffs. She does not look back. Sutton freezes. |