City of Blows
Author/Uploaded by Tim Blake Nelson
Contents Cover Title Page Copyright Contents Prologue Part One Chicago New York City Long Island Part Two Toronto Los Angeles Beverly Hills Kentucky Van Nuys Beverly Hills Mississippi Carthage Hollywood The Beverly Hills Hotel Film Forum Austin Los Feliz&...
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Contents Cover Title Page Copyright Contents Prologue Part One Chicago New York City Long Island Part Two Toronto Los Angeles Beverly Hills Kentucky Van Nuys Beverly Hills Mississippi Carthage Hollywood The Beverly Hills Hotel Film Forum Austin Los Feliz Chateau Marmont Albany Part Three Cannes Beverly Hills Chateau Marmont Beverly Hills Chateau Marmont Los Feliz Malibu Ucm Lobby Howard’s Office Paul’s Office Ucm Conference Room Epilogue Acknowledgements Back Cover Guide Cover Title Page Copyright Contents Prologue Part One Chicago Epilogue Acknowledgements Start to Contents Pagebreaks of the Print Version Cover Page 4 5 8 9 13 14 15 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 CITY OFBLOWS A NOVEL TIM BLAKENELSON The Unnamed PressLos Angeles, CA AN UNNAMED PRESS BOOK Copyright © 2023 by Tim Blake Nelson All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. Permissions inquiries may be directed to [email protected] Published in North America by the Unnamed Press. www.unnamedpress.com Unnamed Press, and the colophon, are registered trademarks of Unnamed Media LLC. Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-951213-65-7eISBN: 978-1-951213-66-4 Library of Congress Control Number: 2022935762 This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Cover Artwork by Claire TrotignonDesigned and Typeset by Jaya Nicely Manufactured in the United States of America by McNaughton & Gunn. Distributed by Publishers Group West First Edition CONTENTS PROLOGUE PART ONE CHICAGO NEW YORK CITY LONG ISLAND PART TWO TORONTO LOS ANGELES BEVERLY HILLS KENTUCKY VAN NUYS BEVERLY HILLS MISSISSIPPI CARTHAGE HOLLYWOOD THE BEVERLY HILLS HOTEL FILM FORUM AUSTIN LOS FELIZ CHATEAU MARMONT ALBANY PART THREE CANNES BEVERLY HILLS CHATEAU MARMONT BEVERLY HILLS CHATEAU MARMONT LOS FELIZ MALIBU UCM LOBBY HOWARD’S OFFICE PAUL’S OFFICE UCM CONFERENCE ROOM EPILOGUE PROLOGUE Solomon Rosenthal arrived in Chicago with two brothers from Latvia just after the turn of the twentieth century. They went to the stockyards, where trains from the west and south deposited herds of a scale they’d never imagined. The country was slaughtering and butchering the way it would learn to make cars and sewing machines. Solomon took work on the killing floor. Unlike his brothers, however, he didn’t drink, and he saved his money. When he found a wife and they had a child, he was always home for dinner. He noticed in his son, Isaac, an incipient intelligence, even a quiet wisdom. A stern sadness emanated from the boy too, but far from troubling Solomon, this reassured him, because in the Fuller Park tenements, and certainly at the slaughterhouse where he was employed, evidence abounded for seeing life as essentially unfair, and those whose outlook tended toward the hopeful, adults and children alike, seemed of lesser mental stuff. Make of it what you would, life was mean. In time his son’s sadness turned hard. The more young Isaac learned, the more he questioned, and the more he questioned, the less it all made sense, and this infuriated him. As he reached his teens, he began to take the frustration out on his father, whom he considered weak and insufficient, but even this Solomon didn’t mind. The adolescent’s wrath simply continued to expose a wisdom that eventually would serve him. The boy’s rages
