Heat 2......

[MK11]

as a novel written by Michael Mann?

Michael Mann is ready to rip on Heat 2, a novel he has written with Edgar-winner Meg Gardiner that expands the tapestry of his 1995 crime classic film. The surprise here: the novel coming August 9 from William Morrow through the HarperCollins-based Michael Mann Books imprint will tell an original story about the lives of the characters in that movie both before and after the events depicted in the movie.

[Lyonsgrid]

Attachment 93499

About to dip into some Friday night reading.
Hopefully it doesn't disappoint.

[blues]

Finished it a few days ago. It was way longer than it needed to be, imho.

Had some good sections I really enjoyed...but in the end, it was an overall "meh" for me and I didn't like that the ending left it open to be continued.

(I won't say more to avoid spoilers.)

[JSGlock34]

I thought it was good, but not great. I posted this in The Films of Michael Mann thread...

I finished Heat 2 this evening.

It was good. Not great, but enjoyable. I was skeptical and cautious going in, but soon I found myself pulled into the book. The writing flows, though sometimes you can tell that the work is a collaboration between two authors. Chris' character arc is intriguing. The settings are interesting. The appearance of familiar characters never seems forced.

I'd give it a solid B. In the end, I'm not sure this was a story that needed to be told. Thankfully, reading it won't affect how I view and enjoy the original film. If they decide to make it into a movie, there's a number of memorable action set-pieces. A raid on a cartel hotel at the Mexican Border. A car chase through LA. But it lacks the depth of the movie; there's nothing close to Hanna and McCauley discussing dreams over coffee.

Perhaps a coincidence, but I see echoes of Mann's past work in here. In some ways, this is a treat. A home invasion crew working Chicago seems to draw inspiration from an episode of Miami Vice (an episode that is appropriately titled, "The Home Invaders"). Heat was a Los Angeles story; Heat 2 is undeniably international. The tri-border region features prominently; I can't help but wonder if some of the scenes set there were originally intended for Mann's 2006 Miami Vice. That film was plagued with production problems, and the international ending (planned for Paraguay) was changed at the last minute to a shootout in Miami.

I'm almost certainly nitpicking here..but this is a firearms forum, so I'll mention it. There's a number of minor gun issues that make me grind my teeth and pull me out of the book. In another story I might not care, but considering the lineage of this book, and Mann's obsession with detail, I'm holding it to a higher standard.

Perhaps more significantly, there's a change to McCauley's backstory that introduces an inconsistency with the original source material. Again, surprising for Mann.

Michael, if you're reading, I'm always available to proof-read your work.

[Wyoming Shooter]

I listened to it on Audible. The narrator was a bit annoying - although he can sound very much like Al Pacino. A good editor would shorten it by a third. Solid but not great - 7/10.

[Erick Gelhaus]

I'm reading it, i'm trying to get into it.