Define Books As Legs (The Albany Cycle #1)
| Original Title: | Legs |
| ISBN: | 0140064842 (ISBN13: 9780140064841) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | The Albany Cycle #1 |
William Kennedy
Paperback | Pages: 320 pages Rating: 3.81 | 1598 Users | 91 Reviews
Identify Containing Books Legs (The Albany Cycle #1)
| Title | : | Legs (The Albany Cycle #1) |
| Author | : | William Kennedy |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | Anniversary Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 320 pages |
| Published | : | January 27th 1983 by Penguin Books (first published May 28th 1975) |
| Categories | : | Fiction. Historical. Historical Fiction. Mystery. Crime. Literature. American. New York. American Fiction |
Explanation During Books Legs (The Albany Cycle #1)
Legs, the inaugural book in William Kennedy’s acclaimed Albany cycle of novels, brilliantly evokes the flamboyant career of gangster Jack “Legs” Diamond. Through the equivocal eyes of Diamond’s attorney, Marcus Gorman (who scraps a promising political career for the more elemental excitement of the criminal underworld), we watch as Legs and his showgirl mistress, Kiki Roberts, blaze their gaudy trail across the tabloid pages of the 1920s and 1930s.Rating Containing Books Legs (The Albany Cycle #1)
Ratings: 3.81 From 1598 Users | 91 ReviewsAppraise Containing Books Legs (The Albany Cycle #1)
The fictionalized biography of real life prohibition gangster Jack "Legs" Diamond, as told by his lawyer. I came to this book as a big fan of Kennedy's Pulitzer Prize winner Ironweed. (Legs is the first book in his so called Albany Cycle. Ironweed is the 3rd.) But in Legs Kennedy doesn't approach the level of skill and emotional depth he would later show in Ironweed. In fact, this book has some problems. There are some weird things with the chronology that bothered me greatly. And throughout theKennedy creates the world of Legs so vividly, I feel like I'm there. Not that I'm an expert on the world of bootleggers during prohibition, but it seems perfect to me. Even beyond that, though, Kennedy gets to the heart of the yearning of his characters. What they hope for. What they dream. How their lives change and acquire meaning as life denies those hopes and dreams. This is a great book for the world is recreates, but an even better one for the human core of the characters in that world
I really enjoyed,"William Kennedy's book ,"Legs!" I actually bought this book from a quaint bookstore on the corner of Dove and Hudson street not far from where I live in Albany, NY. As I was paying for it, the owner told me to look out the window and he said there was the house at 67 Dove street where Jack "Legs," Diamond was shot and murdered on December 18th 1931! He also told me to look next door to another old house next door, that was and still is the house of the Author William Kennedy,
People like killers. And if one feels sympathy for the victims its by way of thanking them for letting themselves be killed. Eugene Ionesco. (The epigraph of Legs.)This is a fictionalized portrayal of the final days of gangster Jack Legs Diamond, who died in a shootout with his enemies in an Albany boarding house in 1931. The book is ironically entitled Legs even though everybody who knew the guy called him Jack. The press invented the sobriquet Legs because Jack outran death. Surviving
The first of the Albany trilogy will be the last read for me but I will read it sometime soon.And now I'm doing it. This book was actually on my to-read shelf and I picked it up somewhere... maybe the local transfer station - a gold mine of free books! I've read "Ironweed" and "Billy Phelan's Greatest Game" so I'm going to go ahead and give a 4* rating(for starters) to the last of the Albany trilogy. Already the tone of the book's been set. Jack Diamond is a violent, charismatic SOB. Warren
Legs: life on the other side of the law; fake romanticism of the criminal world; vulgarity and greed, sentimentality and cruelty, sanctimony and villainy of mobsters; corruption and hypocrisy of society; fraudulence of publicity and prostitution of journalistsConsider the slightly deaf sage of Pompeii, his fly open, feet apart, hand at crotch, wetting surreptitiously against the garden wall when the lava hits the house. Why he never even heard the rumbles. Who among the archaeologists could know
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