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Chasing Elvis
Elvis died in 1977, or did he? In 1982 an Elvis impersonator clumsily robs a bank, and incredibly all of the evidence points to the supposedly deceased Elvis as being the robber. A detective hot on the trail of the robber is convinced that he is chasing Elvis, but is killed in an accidental car crash near Moscow, Tennessee, leaving behind a five-year-old daughter. Twenty years later, the daughter is a tabloid reporter for Weird Magazine, a shameless, check-out counter rag. She is assigned to cover an Elvis Festival in Moscow, discovers her father's notes, and quickly stumbles onto the Elvis-robber's trail. What she discovers in rural Tennessee just may be the news story of the young century.
268 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 4, 2013
Had it not been for the fact that I won Chasing Elvis in return for writing a review, I would probably never have finished reading it. A sense of obligation, not suspense, spurred me on.
I DO want to say, however, that the writer, Glenn Marcel, shows enormous potential. (I hope that doesn't sound condescending because, heaven knows, I couldn't write a novel.) However...this novel is so badly in need of an editor to tighten it up. The plot was so convoluted and some characters appeared to have no REAL part to play since they contributed nothing to the plot itself. And the Sasquatch interlude - what was the point of that? It just went on and on and on - the reader ends up wading through a swamp of verbiage instead of anxiously turning the page! The book needs editing badly!!
Scenes would change in a single page with no indication that the scene HAD changed. Similarly, a single page could be written from a couple of points of view, making it difficult to follow. Some characters were not sufficiently delineated - one character cleaned out his ear with his index finger, and a few pages later, another character did exactly the same thing!
I also question the choice of words in many instances and this is NOT related to the language used by an actual character, but the language of the author himself. The words 'potty' and 'crapper' jumped off the page, as did 'kooks' in reference to a Psychiatric Hospital. And then there are all the 'feinted' instead of 'fainted' and 'bugger' instead of 'booger' and 'madames' instead of 'mesdames.' The author talks of them getting 'underfoot' when he meant 'underway' and 'caught in his own petard' instead of 'hoist with his own petard'...and on and on. Oh, and he describes Maggie as wearing make-up (she is 5 years old) when he meant Mel. and he writes "...she and Richard's relationship..." And please don't say that they are typos - shouldn't the author have read and reread the book before putting it out there?
And all the business of the gun not being declared - sorry, but it's illegal to bring a gun from the States into Canada without declaring it. And when Mel asks what kind of kook would impersonate a dead person at the Elvis festival - she's a reporter for heaven's sake, has she never heard of Tribute Bands?
So, the bottom line, in its present form, I cannot recommend Chasing Elvis.
I DO want to say, however, that the writer, Glenn Marcel, shows enormous potential. (I hope that doesn't sound condescending because, heaven knows, I couldn't write a novel.) However...this novel is so badly in need of an editor to tighten it up. The plot was so convoluted and some characters appeared to have no REAL part to play since they contributed nothing to the plot itself. And the Sasquatch interlude - what was the point of that? It just went on and on and on - the reader ends up wading through a swamp of verbiage instead of anxiously turning the page! The book needs editing badly!!
Scenes would change in a single page with no indication that the scene HAD changed. Similarly, a single page could be written from a couple of points of view, making it difficult to follow. Some characters were not sufficiently delineated - one character cleaned out his ear with his index finger, and a few pages later, another character did exactly the same thing!
I also question the choice of words in many instances and this is NOT related to the language used by an actual character, but the language of the author himself. The words 'potty' and 'crapper' jumped off the page, as did 'kooks' in reference to a Psychiatric Hospital. And then there are all the 'feinted' instead of 'fainted' and 'bugger' instead of 'booger' and 'madames' instead of 'mesdames.' The author talks of them getting 'underfoot' when he meant 'underway' and 'caught in his own petard' instead of 'hoist with his own petard'...and on and on. Oh, and he describes Maggie as wearing make-up (she is 5 years old) when he meant Mel. and he writes "...she and Richard's relationship..." And please don't say that they are typos - shouldn't the author have read and reread the book before putting it out there?
And all the business of the gun not being declared - sorry, but it's illegal to bring a gun from the States into Canada without declaring it. And when Mel asks what kind of kook would impersonate a dead person at the Elvis festival - she's a reporter for heaven's sake, has she never heard of Tribute Bands?
So, the bottom line, in its present form, I cannot recommend Chasing Elvis.
July 5, 2012
This book had promise. I enjoyed the author's writing style. It was quick and snappy. But that's the only thing I enjoyed about this book.
There were a few totally different story lines and it's not 'til you get to the end that you see how they are connected. It all falls into place too conveniently.
I didn't like any of the characters. They were way too quirky to be believable. For example, Bennie is a drug addicted nympho rich kid who is turning tricks for loser Freddy. She's dumb dumb dumb! Her friend, Lannie, isn't much better. There's no sorrow when Lannie's mother dies of cancer ... Bennie and Lannie are more interested in the mom's possessions.
Someone obviously didn't do a very good job in proofreading this book because there were typos and lots and lots of sloppy punctuation ... they need to learn about quotation marks. Very annoying.
Is Elvis the bankrobber? I'd love to tell you so you wouldn't waste your time reading this book but I don't want to spoil the ending if you do read it.
There were a few totally different story lines and it's not 'til you get to the end that you see how they are connected. It all falls into place too conveniently.
I didn't like any of the characters. They were way too quirky to be believable. For example, Bennie is a drug addicted nympho rich kid who is turning tricks for loser Freddy. She's dumb dumb dumb! Her friend, Lannie, isn't much better. There's no sorrow when Lannie's mother dies of cancer ... Bennie and Lannie are more interested in the mom's possessions.
Someone obviously didn't do a very good job in proofreading this book because there were typos and lots and lots of sloppy punctuation ... they need to learn about quotation marks. Very annoying.
Is Elvis the bankrobber? I'd love to tell you so you wouldn't waste your time reading this book but I don't want to spoil the ending if you do read it.
March 11, 2013
Interesting storey that leqves you wondering just what happens next. The Kindle edition has a few formattinh bugs such as having to change to font size once in a while to find the half sentances that have fallen off the bottom of the page,
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews