A review by nickdleblanc
Las puertas del edén by Ethan Coen

3.0

A collection of mostly B-sides of Coen Brothers' movies and sketched ideas. I could do without the radio plays and he relies a bit heavily on characters' voices in a narrative--which can come off as sort of grating when not being filtered through the mouth of great actors. Lots of these stories are just character sketches masquerading as stories. I didn't mind this so much as characters and good dialogue are usually my favorite parts of stories. But, I could have used a bit more narrative voice separated from the characters. But, that's a challenge of reading a short story collection straight through. Coen really shows his command of natural dialogue and sly dark wit throughout. My favorites were The Old Country, A Morty Story, A Fever in the Blood, The Boys, Gates of Eden, and Red Wing. The other stories weren't really worth the time to me. Considering this was from 1999, there are some indications of the films that were to come as well as shades of the previous movies they had worked on up until this point. You can really detect A Serious Man, Fargo, and Miller's Crossing.

If you're a fan of the Coens' work it is worth reading. If not, or if you don't know who I'm talking about, there might be something better out there for you to read.