Crime Novels American Noir of the 1950s
Here we are moving away from looming dread of war and toward the disillusionment of what was waiting for those that returned from overseas.
Antiquarian and Classic Book Reviews
Most old books are written by men. These books were written by women.
Here we are moving away from looming dread of war and toward the disillusionment of what was waiting for those that returned from overseas.
While The Only Problem thankfully took a lot less time to read than Anna Hastings, I didn’t like it all that much. On the whole, I found it a novel that was just very un-Muriel-Spark.
A collection of shorter pieces, and longer prose, all of the writing is connected by Babitz’s love for Southern California’s most famous city and its environs.
This week I’m going to review two McNally selections from earlier this year, both of which are delightful non-fiction reads that I wouldn’t have necessarily chosen off the shelf.
Patricia is not broken by her divorce; instead, she uses it as opportunity to live life on her terms and to determine what it is she wants out of herself and out of a partner. She is a complex character that has a lot to say and also displays a range of emotions that are sometimes contradictory in a very human way.
Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War and Duong Thu Huong’s Novel Without a Name are both novels about the Vietnam War from the perspective of young men who served in the North Vietnamese Army. They are powerful testaments from a viewpoint that we do no often get in the west — that being the Americans as the invading, colonialist army in Vietnam.
Garner is one of those writers that I wish more people had read. I love her writing style, and her clever economy of words that provides the reader enough room to think carefully about every sentence and every turn of phrase.
There is nearly literally something for everyone, but at the same time the narrative doesn’t feel busy or chaotic. Instead, Kennedy encapsulates the complexity of mid-century modern life from a vast number of perspectives.
I’ve decided to review two of Didion’s works (partially because they have been waiting in my to-review stacks for a while, and partially because this is post #222).
Memoirs are tricky sometimes. I only read them when I either am interested in the time period or they focus on something that I read in a literary context.