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Rating: 
Summary: Not Every Novel Can Be a Great One
Review: Jim Thompson is now widely regarded as one of the best crime novelists of the twentieth century. His mix of hard-boiled prose, slimy protagonists and offbeat plots helped put the 'pulp' in pulp fiction. While he may not have been recognized in his own time to any great extent, his influence can be seen in most crime fiction published today, from James Ellroy through Carl Hiassen to Elmore Leonard.But everyone has an off day. THE ALCOHOLICS is a shambling mess of a novel, a plotless and ultimately pointless story of, what else, alcoholics at a run-down detox centre. This does not have to be bad. One can envision a black comedy satire about such a place. ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST covered the same territory in a mental asylum. But Thompson, while showing his usual flair for oddball, unlikeable characters, has placed them within a story that has no drive. It centres around Dr. Peter Murphy, a recovering alcoholic himself (of course), who runs a detox centre which is constantly on the verge of financial destruction. Along with the patients, he has a nurse with a bizarre mean streak, and an orderly with a unique method of medical malpractice. "The inmates are loose, and are running the asylum", is a trite, although apt description of the place. Now, unlikeable characters do not necessarily ruin a novel. Consider M*A*S*H* (the novel), in which some severely unusual people treat each other with hideous cruelty, all to keep from going mad themselves. But where M*A*S*H* had a narrative drive and a deeply felt sense of outrage, THE ALCOHOLICS has scene upon scene of drunks acting stupidly, and doctors acting stupidly, and nurses behaving stupidly, etc. What Thompson has forgotten is to have a point to the whole thing. Jim Thompson has had a literary revival in the past few years, thanks to Black Lizard Publishing. But the rush to rediscover a master should not cloud people's minds to the fact that not everything can be great, and not everything is deserving of publication. Let's file THE ALCOHOLICS alongside the other books written by fine writers on really bad days. CLOSING TIME by Joseph Heller. ISLANDS IN THE STREAM by Ernest Hemingway. THE ALCOHOLICS is in fine company.
Rating:
Summary: Not Every Novel Can Be a Great One
Review: Jim Thompson is now widely regarded as one of the best crime novelists of the twentieth century. His mix of hard-boiled prose, slimy protagonists and offbeat plots helped put the 'pulp' in pulp fiction. While he may not have been recognized in his own time to any great extent, his influence can be seen in most crime fiction published today, from James Ellroy through Carl Hiassen to Elmore Leonard. But everyone has an off day. THE ALCOHOLICS is a shambling mess of a novel, a plotless and ultimately pointless story of, what else, alcoholics at a run-down detox centre. This does not have to be bad. One can envision a black comedy satire about such a place. ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST covered the same territory in a mental asylum. But Thompson, while showing his usual flair for oddball, unlikeable characters, has placed them within a story that has no drive. It centres around Dr. Peter Murphy, a recovering alcoholic himself (of course), who runs a detox centre which is constantly on the verge of financial destruction. Along with the patients, he has a nurse with a bizarre mean streak, and an orderly with a unique method of medical malpractice. "The inmates are loose, and are running the asylum", is a trite, although apt description of the place. Now, unlikeable characters do not necessarily ruin a novel. Consider M*A*S*H* (the novel), in which some severely unusual people treat each other with hideous cruelty, all to keep from going mad themselves. But where M*A*S*H* had a narrative drive and a deeply felt sense of outrage, THE ALCOHOLICS has scene upon scene of drunks acting stupidly, and doctors acting stupidly, and nurses behaving stupidly, etc. What Thompson has forgotten is to have a point to the whole thing. Jim Thompson has had a literary revival in the past few years, thanks to Black Lizard Publishing. But the rush to rediscover a master should not cloud people's minds to the fact that not everything can be great, and not everything is deserving of publication. Let's file THE ALCOHOLICS alongside the other books written by fine writers on really bad days. CLOSING TIME by Joseph Heller. ISLANDS IN THE STREAM by Ernest Hemingway. THE ALCOHOLICS is in fine company.
Rating:
Summary: interesting as a product of its time
Review: Jim Thompson's The Alcoholics was first published in 1953. The paperback copy I checked out is a Canadian edition from 1993. This guy is a crime writer (well, he was, he apparently died in 1977) with a supposedly (according to the New York Review of Books) literary bent.
I found it interesting enough to read through to the end, but it seemed quite contrived and simplistic to me. I would imagine that's probably just a result of its being a product of its time, though. In any case, if real people were like the good and bad characters in the book, the world would probably be a much nicer place than it is, but perhaps not as interesting.
Rating: 
Summary: Subpar for Thompson.
Review: The legendary Jim Thompson has a well deserved reputation as a great writer. Gripping, compelling and unforgettable, a number of his books rank with the very best of 20th century American fiction. The Alcoholics, I'm sorry to say, is not one of these books.
The narrative unfolds over a one day period on the grounds of El Healtho Sanatorium, a rehabilitative facility for alcoholics.
The plot itself is rather flimsy, so the book's success or failure rests firmly on the shoulders of its characters and the things they think, say and do.
By and large, Thompson has populated The Alcoholics with characters who are way over the top. Exaggerated caricatures of real life personality types. There's Dr. Murphy the suicidal psychiatrist, Miss Baker the sadistic RN, Rufus the overly zealous orderly and an assortment of strange alcoholic patients. Quite frankly, I found only Josephine the uneducated but highly capable cook to be of any interest at all.
Thompson's best work can be found in the realm of the noir. That is to say in those books where he takes real life and mercilessly exposes its hidden, dark underbelly. When he tries to create surreal characters and settings, as he does here, the end result is far less satisfying.
Rating:
Summary: El Healtho
Review: This is not a Thompson crime hard boiled noir and I think this is why some reviewers didn't like it. I enjoyed it!
Dr. Murphy runs a dry up clinic for alcoholics called El Healtho that sits above the pacific ocean in which Murphy is trying to drown himself as the book opens. It is early morning and he has been swimming for three hours when a big wave spews him and alot of seaweed on to the beach, a possible Jonah reference there. The book takes us through one day in the clinic and it's cast of characters. The clinic will be closed if Doc Murphy can't come up with fifteen thousand and this poses an ethical problem for Murphy, the only way to get the money is to agree to do something for a rich family that is against the best interests of one of his patients. Besides the alcoholics constantly trying to get a drink you have a sadistic nurse, a vodoo woman who is the cook, and a pregnant actress on the scene. Towards the end they bring in a drunk writer to sober up and Doc Murphy wants to get him sober and get him to write a book abut the clinic, and of course the writer that writes a book about the clinic we now know is Jim Thompson.
Thompson had alot of trouble with alcoholism and I'm sure some of what is in this book comes first hand. I have read much Thompson and although I enjoyed reading this one it is not one of his best.
Rating: 
Summary: the master misfires badly !
Review: While Jim Thompson is one of my favorite authors, even I must admit...The Alcoholics is absolute garbage! The characters have the depth of a thimble. The plot is so thin that it threatens not to exist. The writing is atrocious. It seems like Thompson wrote this over a rough weekend, or even worse...a dull one. The story gets insultingly stupid frequently. In all fairness, it should be pointed out that Thompson had ten books(that's not a misprint!) in 1953-1954. Included in that awesome number were the classics Bad Boy, A Hell Of A Woman, The Nothing Man & The Killer Inside Me had just come out the previous year(1952). So I guess you could say Thompson had a dud coming. Yeah, well...this is that dud. Any prolific writer is going to have his share of trash in the vaults.
Rating:
Summary: the master misfires badly !
Review: While Jim Thompson is one of my favorite authors, even I must admit...The Alcoholics is absolute garbage! The characters have the depth of a thimble. The plot is so thin that it threatens not to exist. The writing is atrocious. It seems like Thompson wrote this over a rough weekend, or even worse...a dull one. The story gets insultingly stupid frequently. In all fairness, it should be pointed out that Thompson had ten books(that's not a misprint!) in 1953-1954. Included in that awesome number were the classics Bad Boy, A Hell Of A Woman, The Nothing Man & The Killer Inside Me had just come out the previous year(1952). So I guess you could say Thompson had a dud coming. Yeah, well...this is that dud. Any prolific writer is going to have his share of trash in the vaults.
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