Down and Out in Hollywood

LOU MATHEWS’S NEW NOVEL Hollywoodski demonstrates that the Hollywood novel is alive and well in the 21st century, albeit as a kind of zombie genre lacking any real sense of direction—a perfect description of the career trajectory of protagonist Dale Davis. Composed of nonlinear fragments spanning 40 years, the novel offers a refreshing update on the tale of the failed screenwriter—or, as Mathews describes it, the faded screenwriter. “Screenwriters can’t fail,” one of the novel’s epigraphs explains; “the bar is set too low. We only fade.”