Pendergast Top Ten
10. His buttery Southern drawl. As one Facebook poster put it, “like hot chocolate fudge over cold vanilla ice cream.”
9. His disdain for authority and red tape. He does what it takes to get something done, rules be damned. “It's a very bad habit, but one I find hard to break.”
8. His dark family background. There are so many peculiar figures lurking in his ancestry, with their own histories of misdeeds, strange behavior, criminality, and even madness...
7. His bling. The 1959 Rolls Royce Silver Wraith. The Les Baer custom .45. The apartment in the Dakota. The black suits. Need we continue?
6. His courtliness and loyalty. He is a man out of his time, whose antebellum manners stand in contrast to our rude and brash modern age. Although he can be unspeakably offensive if crossed, normally he is the epitome of old-school refinement, charm, and courtesy. He is exceedingly private and almost impossible to get to know, but once he has befriended someone, he is utterly loyal and will risk his own life to save their own.
5. His appreciation for the finer things in life. The noblest wines, the finest silk ties, the choicest dishes, the rarest fabrics (vicuña, anyone?), the most exclusive English tailors. Stick Pendergast in a fly-specked diner in some tiny Kansas town, and he nevertheless contrives to manage a supper of steak tartare.
4. His mastery of esoteric Eastern disciplines. Pendergast’s mysterious use of the ancient Tibetan Buddhist mental discipline known as Chongg Ran, and, in particular, turning some of its aspects it into an immensely powerful system for analyzing evidence (which he calls a “memory crossing.”) Chongg Ran has aroused intense curiosity amongst readers because of its closely-guarded secrets. And they are closely guarded, only transmitted by word of mouth, from teacher to student-never put into writing.
3. His class. Pendergast is one classy individual. And no matter how grave or dire the situation, he is never-well, almost never-fazed. As one reader put it: “old school cool.”
2 His distinctive way of phrasing things. “You did not misunderstand me. I lied.”
“I can see that an insufficient, or perhaps even defective, socialization process has led you to believe that four-letter words add power to language.”
And a thousand other peculiar or outrageous statements that have fallen from his lips-confounding, amusing or infuriating his listeners...
1. And finally, his appearance. Our readers seem fascinated by Pendergast’s silvery eyes, blond-white hair, pale skin, and features reminiscent of chiseled marble, his long thin fingers and his feline way of moving. Many fans have created excellent portraits of him, and countless arguments have been sparked about which movie star could best play him. (We also we love his Wikipedia entry.)
9. His disdain for authority and red tape. He does what it takes to get something done, rules be damned. “It's a very bad habit, but one I find hard to break.”
8. His dark family background. There are so many peculiar figures lurking in his ancestry, with their own histories of misdeeds, strange behavior, criminality, and even madness...
7. His bling. The 1959 Rolls Royce Silver Wraith. The Les Baer custom .45. The apartment in the Dakota. The black suits. Need we continue?
6. His courtliness and loyalty. He is a man out of his time, whose antebellum manners stand in contrast to our rude and brash modern age. Although he can be unspeakably offensive if crossed, normally he is the epitome of old-school refinement, charm, and courtesy. He is exceedingly private and almost impossible to get to know, but once he has befriended someone, he is utterly loyal and will risk his own life to save their own.
5. His appreciation for the finer things in life. The noblest wines, the finest silk ties, the choicest dishes, the rarest fabrics (vicuña, anyone?), the most exclusive English tailors. Stick Pendergast in a fly-specked diner in some tiny Kansas town, and he nevertheless contrives to manage a supper of steak tartare.
4. His mastery of esoteric Eastern disciplines. Pendergast’s mysterious use of the ancient Tibetan Buddhist mental discipline known as Chongg Ran, and, in particular, turning some of its aspects it into an immensely powerful system for analyzing evidence (which he calls a “memory crossing.”) Chongg Ran has aroused intense curiosity amongst readers because of its closely-guarded secrets. And they are closely guarded, only transmitted by word of mouth, from teacher to student-never put into writing.
3. His class. Pendergast is one classy individual. And no matter how grave or dire the situation, he is never-well, almost never-fazed. As one reader put it: “old school cool.”
2 His distinctive way of phrasing things. “You did not misunderstand me. I lied.”
“I can see that an insufficient, or perhaps even defective, socialization process has led you to believe that four-letter words add power to language.”
And a thousand other peculiar or outrageous statements that have fallen from his lips-confounding, amusing or infuriating his listeners...
1. And finally, his appearance. Our readers seem fascinated by Pendergast’s silvery eyes, blond-white hair, pale skin, and features reminiscent of chiseled marble, his long thin fingers and his feline way of moving. Many fans have created excellent portraits of him, and countless arguments have been sparked about which movie star could best play him. (We also we love his Wikipedia entry.)