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mschrock8's review against another edition
3.0
Male author, male characters. Indiana author. Glad to have a Sunday afternoon to sit on the porch & read.
tscott907's review against another edition
3.5
Very, very of its time (misogynist, sort of pointlessly racist, etc.) but regardless a startling portrait of emotional fracturing and aimless wandering/finding oneself, or trying to. Marty for president!
armaget's review
lighthearted
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.25
Just didn't strike me as a good book- As in, none of the elements were really that great, but it wasn't all that bad. Kind of entertaining but with stuff that really should not have been that entertaining for me?
I guess there was a point, but the pacing made it so that you'd go so long without it that you forgot about it, or it would come up so condensed that it just hit you over the head and tried to drown you.
Characters were just not that hot- Main guy was obviously modeled after Holden Caulfield and there were multiple references to Catcher in the Rye, but he reminded me of an older, more unlikable Holden with a gargantuan sex drive and no personality.
There's the thing about sex drive here, and sex- The author in the foreword mentioned the outdated sexism here in the book, and that it wasn't his views or anything, it was just a sign of the times- but still it was pretty rough. I feel like I gotta read women-authored books for like a month after this to repay all women, but Sonny (main guy) was part "nice guy" part bordering on "incel" but kind of depressed rather than hostile.
However, as a historical kinda piece I think the book was pretty interesting. The themes about moving on and seeing what you could do different in the world worked incredibly well for this time period and area of the U.S. Any mention to the Reds/Commies, and even when one of the main characters couldn't go swimming because he had grown a beard, an unforgivable offence, were kind of bizarre to me as a modern reader but gave a great background for the story of these characters.
Buuut, the story didn't do much. And since the characters and writing style weren't too hot, I didn't like this one much. However, it offers a really great zeitgeist to the period after the Korean war.
I guess there was a point, but the pacing made it so that you'd go so long without it that you forgot about it, or it would come up so condensed that it just hit you over the head and tried to drown you.
Characters were just not that hot- Main guy was obviously modeled after Holden Caulfield and there were multiple references to Catcher in the Rye, but he reminded me of an older, more unlikable Holden with a gargantuan sex drive and no personality.
There's the thing about sex drive here, and sex- The author in the foreword mentioned the outdated sexism here in the book, and that it wasn't his views or anything, it was just a sign of the times- but still it was pretty rough. I feel like I gotta read women-authored books for like a month after this to repay all women, but Sonny (main guy) was part "nice guy" part bordering on "incel" but kind of depressed rather than hostile.
However, as a historical kinda piece I think the book was pretty interesting. The themes about moving on and seeing what you could do different in the world worked incredibly well for this time period and area of the U.S. Any mention to the Reds/Commies, and even when one of the main characters couldn't go swimming because he had grown a beard, an unforgivable offence, were kind of bizarre to me as a modern reader but gave a great background for the story of these characters.
Buuut, the story didn't do much. And since the characters and writing style weren't too hot, I didn't like this one much. However, it offers a really great zeitgeist to the period after the Korean war.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Antisemitism, Sexism, Racism, Racial slurs, Misogyny, and Self harm
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