heard this recommended multiple times, notably slap, and it was really cool. unlike stuff id read before, lots of complex stuff going on within overarching frameworks of 'thriller novel plots' - pretty postmodern in how it treats the reader/writer relationship... limits of certainty, doubt, meaning etc are all important and v. interesting, the purposely disorientating layered narratives really get you invested in the immediate mysteries as well as mysteries of 'human nature' (to phrase it clunkily)
i like hemingway's writing, and enjoyed this novel... but markedly less so than others of his i'd read. i just didnt get along with the characters that well, the traditionalist masculine:feminine binary i found a bit frustrating... catherine's subservience and helplessness vs. henry's bravado and courage... i dunno it just didnt seem as multi-faceted as the protagonists of For Whom the Bell Tolls or The Sun Also Rises. definitely an interesting account of love's struggle for survival against a context of brutality, death, and expected dedications to country..battle, comrades etc. ending provides a pretty bleak realism to shatter the romantic illusions trying to grow through the novel, which was effective
this in contrast i found super rad. i was aware of the mass hype this novella has.. but after reading it i felt it was deserving. im sure most people have read it... but i will say that it is written beautifully and its exploration of the enrichments and vitality of life - and death - were really cool. nice short emotionally interesting read
was so stoked to finish this - which is quite indicative of my feelings by the end of it... seriously great book, one of the most experimental, interesting, important... but also required a lot of effort..! i really want to read a lot more about it, because i know so many things will have gone over my head... but as an experience just reading it and going with it was awesome. such a fresh way of representing human experience and thought and feelings, especially when you consider the 'victorian novel' it developed away from. the rolling stream-of-consciousness/ free-indirect-speech from character to character seamlessly provides a super-immediate awareness of the tapestry of personal experiences and subjectivities operating in any one scene... and Leopold is awesome. definitely a lot of passages that i had to struggle to get through, but its all part of the reader experience... last 40 pages are rad when the narrative changes to Molly. managed it in 2 and a half weeks which i was pretty proud of .... : )
another one lots will have read... i liked it, nothing i would rave about, but a good read. the withholding of certainty by not documenting the murders really involves you as a reader in the case. rather than coercing you into opinions through emotionally-loaded character depictions Capote's factual style allows personal judgements to develop. the exploring of multiple perspectives on the cause and effect of murder is cool and a little scary at the realisation of the humanism of the 'monster' murderers - well Perry really. gotta appreciate capote's crazy lengths of research and its influence on crime genre too..
enjoyed reading some non-fiction after all the novels i usually read... levi-strauss's account of his travels to Brazil are really interesting on both an anthropological and artistic/philosophical level, he is very perceptive, sensitive and considered in his thoughts and writing, and there are many passages that provide different - i would say purified - responses to people, nature, travel, philosophy, the self etc that i found very compelling. the cultural study is really cool and is presented in a way that is passionately genuine, rather than cold dissection... in that way it was a pretty unifying read of what could easily have been presented as disparate genres, and i believe it was quite influential for this . raddd
reading this at the moment... Conrad is a super incisive writer... really interested to see how it develops, very cool so far. rad explorations of corruption, power, politics, personal choices and London's relationship with these (which im enjoying as a londoner)