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Candy: A Novel of Love and Addiction | 
 enlarge | Author: Luke Davies
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy Used: $8.09
You Save: $5.86 (42%)
New (30) Used (19) Collectible (3) from $8.09
Rating:  81 reviews
Sales Rank: 33093
Media: Paperback
Pages: 304
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.1 x 0.7
ISBN: 0345423879
Dewey Decimal Number: 823
EAN: 9780345423870
ASIN: 0345423879
Publication Date: June 16, 1998
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: BRAND NEW
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Product Description
"Candy is beside me, drenched in sweat. She's breathing gently, long slow breaths. I imagine her soul going in and out: wanting to leave, wanting to come back, wanting to leave, wanting to come back. The day will soon harden into what we need to do. But for now we have each other. . . ."
He met Candy amid a lush Sydney summer. Gorgeous, sexy, free-spirited Candy. They fell in love fast, lots of laughter and lust, the days melting warmly into each other. He never planned to give her a habit. But she wanted a taste. And wasn't love, after all, about sharing lives? Candy had a bit of money and in the beginning, everything was beautiful. Heady, heroin-hazed days, the world open and inviting. But when the money ran out, the craving remained, and the days ceased their luxurious stretch.
But there was still love. Only now, it was a threesome. Heroin had its own demands, its own timetable, and thoughts of nabbing the next fix hurled them into each day. Then, when desperation sets in, Candy will stop at nothing to secure a blast, as she and her lover become hostage to the nightmarish world of addiction.
Painful, sexy, tender, and charged with dark humor, Candy provocatively charts the daily rituals of two lovers maintaining a long-term junk habit. Told in stunningly vivid prose and set against the backdrop of suburban and urban Australia, Candy is both an electrifying and frightening glimpse of contemporary life and love.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 76 more reviews...
 Who Am I? I Am Nothing But Need... August 7, 2004
Schtinky (California)
39 out of 40 found this review helpful
I picked up this book to read before going to sleep one night, and wound up not stopping until I finished at 3AM. Luke Davies has written a completely absorbing tale of a spiraling journey into the night of addiction.
I am a horror aficionado, enjoyer of the ripening decay of flesh, bone, and blood; but in Candy there is a different Monster, a stealthy beast formed from powdery particles that feeds upon the very soul of man, tearing apart mind and spirit long before its teeth sink into the flesh.
So poignantly told in first person perspective, I was so deeply moved by this sad, bittersweet tale of innocent love that I was desperate to see the sun come up in the morning, though for a moment I doubted it would.
Rarely am I as deeply moved by a story as I was by Candy, and rarer still is an author who can breathe such animated life into his character. How can I possibly care about this guy, a junkie who steals and scams allows his wife to work as a prostitute while he nods in front of the TV all night? How can I care about Candy, who goes from aspiring actress to thousand dollar a day escort to street-hooking in the projects?
But I wound out caring a LOT, staying by them just as they stayed by each other, through all the highs and the bitter lows. Their love for each other is immense, innocent, and touching; making you believe just as they did that love can conquer all.
The book follows approximately ten years of their lives, from high-end apartments, to projects, to a run down farm in the country; through crimes and arrests and prostitution; through love and marriage and the loss of a baby; through the languid highs and the horrors of trying to kick the habit; Davies makes you actually feel their love, and their pain. I am not a crier, but I almost did after Candy, the ache I felt inside was so huge and hopeless that it left me weak with sadness.
With all the emotion spilling out from the pages, remember to prepare yourself for some rough scenes; like graphic descriptions of vein hunting and needle usage, along with a disgusting crab lice incident that almost made me hurl.
Plain and simple, this is a `Wow' book; an all-nighter so well written you will feel that you just stayed up with your old friend, listening to him pour out his heart to you. Very highly recommended.
Enjoy!!
compelling February 8, 2000
bob (sydney)
9 out of 9 found this review helpful
Candy is an excellent and compelling story well told. The honesty is brutal and beautiful. Being a heroin user, I found it interesting to hear another's story. Although my story is very different, it was very clear to me that the author knew what he was talking about. One of the books assets is it's tragi-comic nature, something I've found very true in junkie life, and rarely mentioned when discussing heroin. I suppose my only concern is a personal one, in that my father read the book and presumed my life was the same, which it is not. (I've been a relatively good middle class junkie, no crime etc.) The book has been well edited. It is tight and lean. There is not a wasted word, which makes for good reading. Clearly Luke Davies walks it like he talks it. A brave book.
 Together Down the Path of Heroin Addiction June 25, 2002
Michael Ward (Athens, Georgia)
6 out of 9 found this review helpful
This book was pretty good. At first it kind of bored me because Davies only seemed to be writing about the pitfalls of heroin addiction. What I mean is he went through the motions of telling the reader how the nameless Narrator and his girlfriend Candy did all they possibly could to get drugs: pawning off possessions for small amounts of cash, Candy becoming a brothel worker, and the narrator stealing books to pawn and credit card scams. That is all good, but there didn't seem to be any emotion in the writing. William S. Burroughs' Junky and Hubert Selby Jr.'s Requiem for a Dream are much better written on that account. Davies, however, does write some very good chapters on trying to come off heroin. Reading the chapters in which the narrator and Candy try to kick heroin by alcohol and other drugs made me very uncomfortable because I could almost feel the pain they were going through. I can't really understand what they are going through because I don't have a heroin addiction. A good book about heroin addiction, but if you want a book that really makes you feel for the characters read Requiem for a Dream instead.
An Education October 28, 2003
daniel thomas (Wilmington, North carolina United States)
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
I am a narcotics prosecutor in the US who deals with this problem on a daily basis. I have friends who have ruined their lives and others who seem to funtion to a point. This book is the real deal and should be read by anyone concerned with or just wants to educate themselves. If someone you care about has this problem, the book will not help you help them. It will give you an idea of what you are up against. There is always hope and education is a powerful tool. I purchased copies of this book and distributed it to my entire narcotics unit with the hope that compassion will coincide with enforcement.
A new vision May 5, 2000
Claudine Ernstzen (London, England)
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
After reading Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh, a hard, relentless novel with no space for tenderness, Candy came as both a shock and a surprise. I had not heard of Luke Davies before I read this novel but would reccomend this book to ANYONE. At the core it is a love story filled with hope, tenderness and that clinging desperation that only lovers can feel and that is what makes the book so challanging and moving. It isn't just about another junkie it's about two almost anonymous people, anyone really. I could not put this book down and it is the only book I have read twice with as much lustre the second time round as the first. The unnamed narrator and his wild girlfriend are strangely endearing and I couldn't help but sympathise with the downward spiral of thier lives. As a British person I could identify with the style of this book a lot better than any novel from America, apart from the setting the book could be about British people and I liked the ambiguity of that.If you liked Trainspotting then you'll love this.
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