Thursday, September 22, 2011

Daniel Polansky

Daniel Polansky is the author of Low Town.

According to Publishers Weekly, "Polansky hits all the right notes in his intelligent first novel, a blend of dystopian fantasy and hard-boiled crime....Sharp, noir-tinged dialogue and astute insights into class struggle mark Polansky as a writer with a future."

Polansky's reply to my recent query about what he was reading:
I just finished reading The Old Regime and the Revolution by Alexis de Tocqueville, which was the first part of what was meant to be a meditation on the French Revolution comparable to his epic work Democracy in America, but which death stopped him from completing. I'm really fascinated by the French Revolution, and obviously Tocqueville is one of the great historical thinkers of all time so this was really a pleasure to wade into.

On a somewhat lighter end I also just put away Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré, which was awful fun although probably about 150 pages longer than it needed to be. I also think it's funny that, between Le Carré and Ian Fleming we've been given this impression of the British intelligence agencies as being hyper competent, when mostly all they did during the Cold War was leak information to the Soviets. Thanks Kim Philby!
Visit Daniel Polansky's website.

My Book, The Movie: Low Town.

--Marshal Zeringue