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3.97 AVERAGE
3.97 AVERAGE
Pulitzer? Really?? I stuck with the first 20 hours of this audiobook thinking it had to get better but it’s just an overdrawn character study of a shallow character and all the shallow people who enabled his evil behavior by befriending him.
The narration was well done which is the only reason I got as far as I did. Much too much tedium, details of meaningless conversations, over and over again.
The narration was well done which is the only reason I got as far as I did. Much too much tedium, details of meaningless conversations, over and over again.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
I'm not going to lie, this is a very tough read. My dad recommended it as these murders took place shortly after we moved to the Provo/Orem area and he knew a lot of the people in the book. It's heavy, and I was already against capital punishment before I started this book. The death penalty had been halted due to some SCOTUS rulings and this was the first to be carried out in about 10 years. In this case, at least they had the right person, but the whole process is barbaric and so often they have gotten it wrong.
dark
emotional
informative
sad
medium-paced
This is a bit of a dark book to end the year with, but I suppose that’s fitting given the kind of year we’ve had…
The Executioner’s Song is the story of Gary Gilmore, an antisocial criminal convicted of murder and sentenced to death in the 1970′s. He was incarcerated for the vast majority of his life, including as an adolescent, for a variety of crimes. He never seemed to recover from those experiences to the extent that he could live a healthy, productive life on the other side of those bars.
Briefly paroled in the 1970′s, he wound up falling in love with a young girl, Nicole Baker, that resulted in one of the most complex, enmeshed, and (I would say, though some might disagree) unhealthy relationships of all time. Gilmore was incredibly manipulative; so much so that he began encouraging Nicole to commit suicide a number of times after being sentenced to death so that no one else could ‘have her’ after he was gone. He was jealous, vindictive, smart, violent, and very much a predator. There’s some speculation, in fact, that he had tendencies toward pedophilia that were never fully confessed.
This book humanizes Gilmore to some extent, and at many times throughout the story, I found myself very much conflicted between feeling sorry for him, and being utterly repulsed by him.
It’s an interesting and somewhat disturbing read that I wouldn’t recommend to anyone who’s easily bothered by explicit material (gore, violence, sex, etc.). That said, in a larger sense, using Gilmore’s unique story and circumstances, Mailer also offers us a mental exercise in morality and the ethics of capital punishment that I found compelling.
I’m closing the cover and putting this one on the shelf now, hoping for a brighter, better, more humane and sane 2018.
The Executioner’s Song is the story of Gary Gilmore, an antisocial criminal convicted of murder and sentenced to death in the 1970′s. He was incarcerated for the vast majority of his life, including as an adolescent, for a variety of crimes. He never seemed to recover from those experiences to the extent that he could live a healthy, productive life on the other side of those bars.
Briefly paroled in the 1970′s, he wound up falling in love with a young girl, Nicole Baker, that resulted in one of the most complex, enmeshed, and (I would say, though some might disagree) unhealthy relationships of all time. Gilmore was incredibly manipulative; so much so that he began encouraging Nicole to commit suicide a number of times after being sentenced to death so that no one else could ‘have her’ after he was gone. He was jealous, vindictive, smart, violent, and very much a predator. There’s some speculation, in fact, that he had tendencies toward pedophilia that were never fully confessed.
This book humanizes Gilmore to some extent, and at many times throughout the story, I found myself very much conflicted between feeling sorry for him, and being utterly repulsed by him.
It’s an interesting and somewhat disturbing read that I wouldn’t recommend to anyone who’s easily bothered by explicit material (gore, violence, sex, etc.). That said, in a larger sense, using Gilmore’s unique story and circumstances, Mailer also offers us a mental exercise in morality and the ethics of capital punishment that I found compelling.
I’m closing the cover and putting this one on the shelf now, hoping for a brighter, better, more humane and sane 2018.
What better time to read a 1056 page book than lockdown?
I've had this on my shelf for years and have actually started it three times before this time and only got 300 pages in, but this time I got alllll the way through it.
It's really good - that has to be said. To read over 1000 pages you have to really like a book and I did. It could definitely have done with an edit, but reading the afterword you can see why Mailer and his editors won't have wanted to cut anything out of it.
There were too many people in the second half for it to be really coherent, but that was definitely the most interesting part. The portrayal of all the media and legal manoeuvring that took place around the execution was fascinating.
But after 1056 pages I'm ready to say goodbye to the story of Gary Gilmore.
I've had this on my shelf for years and have actually started it three times before this time and only got 300 pages in, but this time I got alllll the way through it.
It's really good - that has to be said. To read over 1000 pages you have to really like a book and I did. It could definitely have done with an edit, but reading the afterword you can see why Mailer and his editors won't have wanted to cut anything out of it.
There were too many people in the second half for it to be really coherent, but that was definitely the most interesting part. The portrayal of all the media and legal manoeuvring that took place around the execution was fascinating.
But after 1056 pages I'm ready to say goodbye to the story of Gary Gilmore.
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
reflective
tense
medium-paced
dark
emotional
reflective
slow-paced