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cruelspirit 's review for:
Revenge of the Lawn: Stories 1962-1970
by Richard Brautigan
funny
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
A highly anticipated return to the works of Richard Brautigan. After reading and highly enjoying Trout Fishing in America and A Confederate General From Big Sur last year, I was excited to revisit the strange but delightful world of Richard Brautigan. There were many places I could have gone next but I decided to go with Revenge of the Lawn, mainly for the title although it being a collection of stories from 1962-1970 I thought it might be a good bridge into his later works of the 1970s.
Revenge of the Lawn started off very strong. I was finding at least one in every five stories to be one of my favorites of his. It was clear that with some of these longer stories (the 3-4 page ones) we were really getting a growth from Brautigan and a perfection of his short story formula. That being said I did feel a quality drop after the first 70 or so pages. There were still stories I really liked after this point but they were coming by less frequently.
I think some of this quality disparity can be related to the fact that this is not a singe, cohesive (for Brautigan) work but rather a collection of stories across eight years of his career and these eight years were probably the most impactful of his career. Some stories feel on par with his work from the early 60's, some feel like the next step in his writing ability, and some just feel like filler. That being said, even filler from Brautigan is often times better than most writers. You get a sense of his career progression, some stories reflect on his success or the events of the later 60s but often times you are just emersed in the world of Brautigan's reflections on childhood, love life, or other matters.
While there were some great highs in this book I wasn't fully blown away. There are a few essential works of his from the late 60s that I'm skipping over for the time being I'm excited to see where his writing goes as I explore some of his works from the 1970s. I already have a copy of Willard and His Bowling Trophies that I've been eyeing ever since I acquired it.
Revenge of the Lawn started off very strong. I was finding at least one in every five stories to be one of my favorites of his. It was clear that with some of these longer stories (the 3-4 page ones) we were really getting a growth from Brautigan and a perfection of his short story formula. That being said I did feel a quality drop after the first 70 or so pages. There were still stories I really liked after this point but they were coming by less frequently.
I think some of this quality disparity can be related to the fact that this is not a singe, cohesive (for Brautigan) work but rather a collection of stories across eight years of his career and these eight years were probably the most impactful of his career. Some stories feel on par with his work from the early 60's, some feel like the next step in his writing ability, and some just feel like filler. That being said, even filler from Brautigan is often times better than most writers. You get a sense of his career progression, some stories reflect on his success or the events of the later 60s but often times you are just emersed in the world of Brautigan's reflections on childhood, love life, or other matters.
While there were some great highs in this book I wasn't fully blown away. There are a few essential works of his from the late 60s that I'm skipping over for the time being I'm excited to see where his writing goes as I explore some of his works from the 1970s. I already have a copy of Willard and His Bowling Trophies that I've been eyeing ever since I acquired it.