Ακαπούλκο

by Burt Hirschfeld, Μπαρτ Χίρσφελντ, Μανώλης Κορνήλιος (Translator)

Σε δύο τόμους

Out of print - Εκτός κυκλοφορίας

Mass Market Paperback

First published October 1, 1971

About the author

Burt Hirschfeld was the author of over fifty books, several of them best-sellers. Probably his best known (and best-selling) novels are his Fire Island Tetralogy: Fire Island, Cindy on Fire, Fire in the Embers and Return to Fire Island.

In addition to his original novels, he wrote movie adaptations and television series adaptations.

Hirschfeld was born and raised in New York City. He served in the U.S. Army during World War II

Reviews

[Kurt Reichenbaugh]

What? No one reviewed ACAPULCO yet? Fixing that now, not because it's the greatest forgotten novel of the 70s but because I wanted something to read on plane ride, and this one was ready to go into the backpack. It could have been ULYSSES but...

Anyway, this is very much a novel of its day as a cast of characters armed with various neuroses and hangups descend on Acapulco in the late winter months. Half of the characters are there to film a movie named "Love, Love" (yes, that's really the name of their movie). You've got the bullying pig-minded producer, the tortured artistic-minded director, and the beautiful lost-soul star with the wayward past. Added to that is a faded, once fabulously wealthy socialite, a bullheaded father and his hippie son, a well-meaning anthropologist and an out-in-the-fringes sketchy forty year old beachboy. Everyone is hellbent on stirring up a potpourri of soapsuds for the sun-baked, nicotine addicted, beach (or poolside) reader of 1971. Hirschfeld's writing is smooth and professional, and damn it, I got sucked into the story. There's a lot of hot sex, wanton abandon, drugs and tripping, social commentary, love, betrayal and all that cool stuff going on.

ACAPULCO is a relic of a genre that is gone away and forgotten in the cynical world of commercial publishing today. Whatever, I'll take this stuff over most of that oh-so-earnest hi-falutin modern lit of guilt-addled professional suburban urbanites of the 2000s anytime. You know the ones I'm referring to...they buy movie tickets from their smartphones, order lattes from the drive-thru and ponder subjects like whether Nick Carraway is gay or not. (I just can't resist that last jab!)

[Librosconkylie]

I had high hopes going in, and was quickly questioning if this was for me. The majority of the novel was conversations between all the characters, and took a long time to get to any action. Once 170 ish pages in, I enjoyed the storyline a bit more but definitely one I wouldn’t recommend to everyone.