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Earthquake Weather
A veteran filmmaker and novelist now creates a riveting noir set in the power-mad jungle of Hollywood. In Earthquake Weather a natural disaster shakes a city and an industry to their cores, revealing new layers of deceit, desire, and deadly aggression.
Hollywood. The land of dreams and schemes. Mark Hayes has a dream. To make movies. But that’s easier wished for than done. Years of frustrating career moves have yielded little progress and Mark now finds himself in a dead end job as a “creative executive” for the loathsome producer, Dexter Morton at Prescient Pictures, the hottest new production company in town. A job like that could lead to big things—but Dexter Morton has no interest in promoting Mark’s ambitions. Then a major earthquake rocks Los Angeles and all deals are off. And when Mark finds a body floating in Dexter’s pool he goes from D-Boy to murder suspect before he can say “three picture deal”.
In the interest of self-preservation Mark must find out who the true killer is before he is jailed or becomes the next victim. The list of suspects is The hot young screenwriter who has been fired from his own project, the director of Prescient Pictures’ most recent film who will do anything for final cut, the re-write man who has been toiling in anonymity for years because he passed forty ages ago, the wanna-be actress who would do anything—and anyone— for stardom, the blackmailing producer who knows more about the staff of Prescient Pictures than anyone wants to admit.
As the noose tightens around the guilty and innocent alike, tensions rise and the earth rumbles. No one can trust the ground they walk on or the people they work with. In a town where power and control can shift suddenly, everyone wants credit for everything—except, of course, murder.
From the Hardcover edition.
Hollywood. The land of dreams and schemes. Mark Hayes has a dream. To make movies. But that’s easier wished for than done. Years of frustrating career moves have yielded little progress and Mark now finds himself in a dead end job as a “creative executive” for the loathsome producer, Dexter Morton at Prescient Pictures, the hottest new production company in town. A job like that could lead to big things—but Dexter Morton has no interest in promoting Mark’s ambitions. Then a major earthquake rocks Los Angeles and all deals are off. And when Mark finds a body floating in Dexter’s pool he goes from D-Boy to murder suspect before he can say “three picture deal”.
In the interest of self-preservation Mark must find out who the true killer is before he is jailed or becomes the next victim. The list of suspects is The hot young screenwriter who has been fired from his own project, the director of Prescient Pictures’ most recent film who will do anything for final cut, the re-write man who has been toiling in anonymity for years because he passed forty ages ago, the wanna-be actress who would do anything—and anyone— for stardom, the blackmailing producer who knows more about the staff of Prescient Pictures than anyone wants to admit.
As the noose tightens around the guilty and innocent alike, tensions rise and the earth rumbles. No one can trust the ground they walk on or the people they work with. In a town where power and control can shift suddenly, everyone wants credit for everything—except, of course, murder.
From the Hardcover edition.
303 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
December 12, 2017
A few good character, but the story quickly becomes pointless and trite.
September 15, 2015
DISJOINTED AND DISAPPOINTING
Billed as a Hollywood crime novel depicting the dark heart of the movie business, Earthquake Weather falls far short. Mark Hayes, the protoganist, is a creative executive in Hollywood who can be moral, heroic, cynical, ambitious, driven, lazy, weak, confused, single-miinded, humorous and a variety of other contradictory things depending on which of the almost 60 short chapters one is reading in this book. As a character this may make Mark human, unfortunately as a narrator it only confuses the reader.
The book's secondary cast is a set of boiler-plate characters - a movie mogul tyrant, Mark's hedonistic room-mate, a beautiful starlet turned crack-whore, street rappin' gang members, a pair of Joe Friday type homocide detectives and world weary yet enigmatic screen writers - who inexplicably show up and disappear. To spice things up there is some contrived tension with a maniacal rattlesnake, the return from the dead of a saloon owner and a couple of stand-offs with our hero and LA gang members. If this is all sounding a little like something Raymond Chandler might have written - well he's in here too, although why is unclear.
The "mystery" involves the death of the movie mogul, (Mark's boss), who is murdered about a third of the way into the book and is solved by Mark, when "everything clicks", about ten pages from the ending. No clues, no pursuit of suspects - just the murder and then the identification of the murderer. The book contains dozens of vignettes, some humorous and some well written but at least in my mind it doesn't hold together as a story, a mystery or a novel.
Billed as a Hollywood crime novel depicting the dark heart of the movie business, Earthquake Weather falls far short. Mark Hayes, the protoganist, is a creative executive in Hollywood who can be moral, heroic, cynical, ambitious, driven, lazy, weak, confused, single-miinded, humorous and a variety of other contradictory things depending on which of the almost 60 short chapters one is reading in this book. As a character this may make Mark human, unfortunately as a narrator it only confuses the reader.
The book's secondary cast is a set of boiler-plate characters - a movie mogul tyrant, Mark's hedonistic room-mate, a beautiful starlet turned crack-whore, street rappin' gang members, a pair of Joe Friday type homocide detectives and world weary yet enigmatic screen writers - who inexplicably show up and disappear. To spice things up there is some contrived tension with a maniacal rattlesnake, the return from the dead of a saloon owner and a couple of stand-offs with our hero and LA gang members. If this is all sounding a little like something Raymond Chandler might have written - well he's in here too, although why is unclear.
The "mystery" involves the death of the movie mogul, (Mark's boss), who is murdered about a third of the way into the book and is solved by Mark, when "everything clicks", about ten pages from the ending. No clues, no pursuit of suspects - just the murder and then the identification of the murderer. The book contains dozens of vignettes, some humorous and some well written but at least in my mind it doesn't hold together as a story, a mystery or a novel.
July 3, 2011
Earthquake Weather was a thriller chock full of interesting insights about the exciting and cutthroat nature of the American film industry. I found the narrator very easy to relate to, particularly because he constantly refused to let cynicism and disappointment (about emphasis on profits, ambition and greed over true artistry) to totally devour his love for filmaking or his frail hopes for the future. The plot was also fairly suspenseful and I was hooked from the first page (particularly because I love interesting first-person narrators). I am definitely putting the rest of the Mark Hayes series on my to-read list!
May 17, 2014
Earthquake Weather and Blonde Lightning follow the fortunes of would-be filmmaker Mark Hayes and his neighbour, writer-director Clyde McCoy. In the first, Mark’s boss is found dead in his pool and the prime suspect is Mark, although the despicable producer had no shortage of enemies. Mark’s dream is to make quality films, but he’s on the verge of being branded a loser. If that happens, he’s sunk. His only hope is to find the killer.
The books provide an inside look at the industry. They’rere funny and the descriptions are great, especially of the earthquakes. And practically all the characters are named after noir writers.
The books provide an inside look at the industry. They’rere funny and the descriptions are great, especially of the earthquakes. And practically all the characters are named after noir writers.
Want to read
May 24, 2007Recommended by Michael Connolly.
July 27, 2009
Nice little thriller set in Hollywood.
August 5, 2012
A grim Hollywood thriller, but just not in the same league as Lankford's "Shooters".
December 15, 2015
Great post-Chandler LA Noir, and also a funny, accurate portrait of life in post-1994-earthquake Los Angeles.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews