Review: An okay first draft, but the research often overwhelms the story
Rating: 3 out of 5
Date: 09 30, 2012
Play Him Again mixes two stories that are, in theory, both pretty dear to my heart. One is the story of criminals living in Los Angeles under Prohibition - not just rum runners, but conmen, mobsters, thugs, and a slew of other colorful underworld types. It's a time period that lends itself to stories set in a teeming city of criminals, and it's no surprise that Stone (who's clearly done a lot of research) finds a lot of meat to chew on here. The other story, one that's oddly intertwined with the criminal element, is the story of Hollywood's transition from silent films to sound films. It's a fascinating time in the movie industry, one in which people who had just begun to master their new art form were asked to change everything. And for a reader like me - one that truly loves cinema and has a weakness for gangster stories - Play Him Again should be like catnip for me. And, to be fair, at its best moments, it is...but those moments don't come often enough, as Stone struggles to integrate these two stories plus show off all the research he did while telling a tale of revenge. I can't deny that Stone knows his time period or his setting; indeed, one of the best aspects of Play Him Again is the way it immerses you in early 20th century Los Angeles, anchoring you in neighborhoods, docks, Hollywood studios, and more. But the characters never quite come to life as well as the setting, and some of that is because they feel more like stock characters than truly fleshed out creations. Even the main character feels like a series of archetypes - a feeling not helped by Stone's tendency to monologue about history or Hollywood or to spend way too much time reveling in his research, including once adding in explanatory footnotes to his dialogue in one of the worst breakings of the fourth wall I've ever seen in a book.Play Him Again is a decent enough crime novel; even though you've seen a lot of the elements before, they're nicely backed by great research here, and the addition of the Hollywood elements makes for an interesting and unique hook. But in most ways, Play Him Again is a first effort at a book, and it's one with a lot of pacing, rough writing, uncomfortable dialogue, and some character problems that keep it from being a real success. Given a few revisions, I think it could have been great; as it stands, it's an intriguing premise that needs some work to come to life in a satisfying way.