What is your opinion regarding the author’s writing himself into the last few Dirk Pitt® novels? Egocentric or clever literary device? Having read all of Cussler’s works, I know that his life closely parallels that of his hero, but who came first, Pitt or Cussler? I can’t imagine Mr. Cussler financing his salvage operations without the help of these very successful novels.
So what do y’all think?
Thanks
Quasi
Thanks
Q
IIRC, he’s written himself into all of them. Or almost all. I’ve always seen it as a bit egocentric, personally, but I read them anyway.
And yep, Dirk Pitt came before NUMA, he has definitely parlayed the success of his writing career into funding what he really wanted to do.
Would that I could do the same.
I just started reading his books this summer. I think it’s pretty cool that he’s been writing himself into the books. Has anyone finished reading Valhalla Rising yet?
I read all the Dirk Pitt novels up through Dragon, which was so bad it broke me of the habit, and as I recall, Cussler would always turn up briefly during a pause in the proceedings with some reference to his being strangely familiar to Pitt, then the story would be on its way again.
I’ve read them all, with the exception of the last two or three. The plots seemed to be getting more and more silly, and I finally lost interest in the series. Cussler putting himself into the books really got on my nerves. The first one I recall was the one where, in the middle of the adventure, the story screeches to a halt for an entire chapter where Pitt competes against Cussler in a vintage auto race. :rolleyes: From then on, I think he appeared in all the books, even helping Pitt to fight the criminals.
I liked the earlier books a lot, however. Night Probe was maybe my favorite, with Pitt going up against an un-named British agent… 
Eric
Unfortunately, yes.
I’ve read all the Dirk Pitt stories, and the last couple have gotten pretty stinky. In “Valhalla Rising” particularly, the characters seem flat and boring, almost caricatures of themselves. As I read it, I kept getting the impression that Cussler just cut & pasted whole passages from earlier books, and then changed a few names to protect the guilty.
And Cussler writes himself into this one in a big way. His appearance is crucial to the plot, and he helps save the day. I guess a rich guy with the worlds most advanced yacht showing up like the cavalry coming over the hill is not too farfetched in these kinds of books, but the fact that it was the author himself just made me think that Cussler is beginning to think he is Dirk Pitt, and that he can write anything and people will buy it. True for now, probably, but not if he writes many more like that.
And the ending stank with a capital S. I won’t go into many details, there may be those who still want to read it, but I thought it was a very poor rip-off of John MacDonald’s “The Lonely Silver Rain”.
Ugly
What annoyed me about his writing himself in was that he did it as a plot device to get Pitt back on track, more often than not. Not to mention his annoying habit of having Pitt FORGET ‘Cussler’ from book to book. You’d think he’d remember this strange guy that he keeps running into, in the strangest places, but NOOO…