Chicodemoda

Stumbled upon this site and have been reading a lot of the threads. I think I'll like it here. Lots of heady, intellectual discussion. Anyway, here goes:

The Great:

1. Go Tell it on the Mountain -- James Baldwin
2. East of Eden -- John Steinbeck
3. War and Peace -- Leo Tolstoy
4. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter -- Carson McCullers
5. Moneyball -- Michael Lewis
6. The Master and Margarita -- Mikhail Bulgakov

The Good:

7. A Scanner Darkly -- Philip K. Dick
8. Post Office -- Charles Bukowski
9. Humboldt's Gift -- Saul Bellow
10. Rabbit Redux -- John Updike
11. Middlesex -- Jeffrey Eugenides
12. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer -- Mark Twain
13. Freakonomics -- Steven Levitt
14. Midnights' Children -- Salman Rushdie
15. The Bell Jar -- Sylvia Plath
16. The Unbearable Lightness of Being -- Milan Kundera

The Meh:

17. The Zero -- Jess Walter
18. The Power and the Glory -- Graham Greene
19. The Kite Runner -- Khaled Hosseini
20. The Tipping Point -- Malcolm Gladwell

The Bad:

21. The Heart of the Matter -- Graham Greene
22. On the Road -- Jack Kerouac
23. The Man Who Was Thursday -- G.K. Chesterton

Tommy_Harn

OK, I'll bite. How so?

The book is probably in my Top 20 favorite books, so I'm curious to hear your thoughts on why you found it so poor. While it was definitely a disjointed (and flawed) piece of fiction, I always found Dean's character extremely interesting, enough so that it made for a very enjoyable read.

Chicodemoda

Kerouac's exuberance really wore thin, and after awhile it could not mask the fact that, to me, the novel was merely a well-written travel log.

First they went over here and got drunk. Then they got in a car and went over there. Then they ran out of money and slept here. Then they went back home for awhile. Then Dean came and they got drunk and went over here.

I know I am unfairly simplifying, but I felt the book lacked the keen observations and insight that make a great novel. It started off exciting but in the end I was pretty bored.

Dean was definitely an interesting character, but Sal Paradise was too passive as a narrator for my liking.

I know I am in the miniscule minority here as the book is universally praised, but it struck no chords with me even though I have travelled cross-country 4 or 5 times when I was younger.

Tommy_Harn

Fair enough. I found the above to be what was charming about the book, but to each his own.

Welcome to the forum.

DVD.guy

Welcome to the forum Chicodemoda.

You have a very interesting reading list. I'll give some of those a read. Thanks

djmont

There's still 3 days left in the year -- aren't you going to read anything else?

That's time for at least another book or two!

Welcome.

Chicodemoda

Heh. I only read 23 this year -- although you could say War and Peace is the equivelant of 5 books -- so I'm only at a two book per month average. Not enough time!

And thank you.

djmont

I need to read 2 more to get to 150 for the year... so I'd better pick something short. No War and Peace for me.