Category Archives: Book Reviews

Review of The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

Review of the Moviegoer by Walker Percy

Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 54: The Moviegoer by Walker Percy (1961)

This is a series of reflections reading through Time Magazine’s top 100 novels as selected by Lev Grossman and Richard Lacayo published since 1923 (when Time magazine was founded). For me this is an attempt to broaden my exposure to authors I may not encounter otherwise, especially as a person who was not a liberal arts major in college. Time’s list is alphabetical, so I decided to read through in a random order, and I plan to write a short reflection on each novel.

The Moviegoer is a book where the prose is lyrical set in the late 1950s New Orleans region. Binx Bolling (full name John Bickerson Bolling) is a stock trader who lives in a middle-class suburb called Gentilly, but who frequently goes into New Orleans to see his aunt (Emily Cutrer, who raised him) and his cousin Kate Cutrer. Binx is torn between his existential quest to avoid everydayness and his enjoyment of movies and the women he hires as his secretaries. He holds one moment ba

ck in the war after he had been shot as a moment when life had meaning but he also seems to revel in his own listless approach to life. His cousin Kate avoids committing herself to life as much as Binx and seems only held to life by the possibility of suicide. Between his aunt, who is the center of gravity in the family, Kate with her non-commitance to life, and Binx caught in his own unmoving existentialism the characters and the story conspire to remain stuck.

This was a book where I could see how the language could attract the attention of Lev Grossman and Richa

rd Lacayo, and perhaps the appeal of the existential crisis of people who in their own way rebelled against the conformity of the 1950s. As a reader I found the book incredibly frustrating. It was an example of spending pages describing something in a refined stream of consciousness which allowed the story and characters to remain stuck. I understand that Binx and the rest of the family are antiheroes in their own way, and I have also lived in Louisiana, although this is not unique to Louisiana or the south, and have met people who used similar tactics to remain stuck in their malaise. These experiences may have enhanced my frustration with the characters in the story. Others may love this short book, but it was not for me.

A Review of A Passage to India by E. M. Foster

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 70: A Passage to India by E. M. Foster (1924)

A Passage to India is an uncomfortable read. It is a story set in India under British colonial rule and is a story of multiple cultures that do not communicate effectively with each other. There is the British citizens who view themselves as people bringing civilization to the people of India and view the Indian people as inferior and dangerous. Even among the Indians there are the divisions between Muslim and Hindu Indians. Two women come to India, Mrs. Moore and Mrs. Adela Quested, to visit Mrs. Moore’s son, Ronny who is the magistrate for the fictional city of Chandrapore. Both women hope to experience India while they are there, but the English citizens in India, especially the women, keep to the safety of their compounds. Mrs. Quested is also trying to decide if she will marry Ronny Moore, and initially she is inclined to break off the engagement, but in a stressful situation she agrees to marry Ronny. Later the two women go on an outing to the Marabar Hills with Doctor Aziz, a Muslim Indian doctor who attempts to meet the expectations of these English women. Yet, Adela Quested in a moment of being overwhelmed in the cave first, unknowingly, insults Doctor Aziz and then later accuses him of assaulting her.

The English, except for Cyril Fielding the headmaster of a small government run college for Indians, are convinced of Doctor Aziz’ guilt, and the Indians rally around the Doctor. Eventually in the trial Mrs. Quested withdraws her accusation and Doctor Aziz is freed, but animosity remains between all the characters until almost the end of the story. It is a story of miscommunication and varied expectations between cultures. English, Muslims, and Hindus in the story often have no interest in understanding one another.

I cannot say I enjoyed this book. I understand why it is an important book, especially when it was published in 1924. Even though E. M. Foster attempts to be sympathetic to the Indian characters in the story, there are times that I cringe at the way he portrays them. Part of this may be that I live in an area with a large Indian population and although their level of education and their exposure to western society is different that what colonial India would have experienced in the 1920s, there are times when the colonial attitudes the book is attempting to critique still come through.

Review of Rabbit, Run by John Updike

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 76: Rabbit, Run by John Updike (1960)

Rabbit, Run is the story of Harry “Rabbit” Angstrom a former basketball star who now feels trapped in a meaningless job and an unsatisfying marriage. Coming home after a brief experience on the basketball court with some younger boys he looks at his life with his wife Janice as a trap and he initially makes a run in his car planning to leave for the south, but then returns to the area and seeks out his old basketball coach. His former coach lost his job in a scandal and soon connects “Rabbit” with Ruth Leonard who was a prostitute at the time. Harry moves in with Ruth for several months and starts a new job as a gardener which he enjoys. Harry has developed a relationship with the Episcopal priest in town who gave him the connection for the new job but is also attempting to reunite Harry with his wife. Harry leaves the now pregnant Ruth when he learns that his wife Janice is having their second child and attempts to restart his life with his wife and a job at his father-in-law’s auto dealership. Harry’s newfound devotion is short lived and his harsh words for his wife and departure cause her to return to drinking and leads to the accidental death of their newborn daughter by drowning. During the funeral “Rabbit” runs again attempting to find some feeling that he seems incapable of holding on to.

I understand that the book attempts to point to the emptiness of the middle-class life of the 1960s for husbands expected to be the provider for wife and children with little concern for their own happiness. Yet, Harry Angstrom was a vapid character for me. He seems completely unable to consider the consequences on anyone action and expects everyone to pick up the pieces as he walks away. Anytime things get difficult he runs and attempts to find someone new to take him in. Rather than the emptiness of the middle-class life of the 1960s I felt like John Updike left us with an empty man as his main character.

Every book is not for every reader, and when a story fails for me, I often wonder what it is that makes me not the best reader of the book, particularly a book other intelligent readers have enjoyed. For me the main character, Harry Angstrom, is an empty man-a person with very little dimension and depth who is driven by his instincts and who has no concern for the consequences of his actions on others. From the moment “Rabbit” runs and leaves his young son I lost my sympathy for him. I struggled to want to spend much time with any of the characters and the plot of a man who runs away rather than attempt to find a way through the struggles was also not appealing to me. Others will enjoy John Updike’s writing or the way he pokes fun at religion, familial structure, and overall loss of meaning at the beginning of the 1960s. For me the primary emotion it evoked was disgust at the main character. That may be the intent as it looks at empty men like “Rabbit” but that makes for a difficult book to stomach.

Review of At Swim Two Birds by Flann O’Brien

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 9: At Swim Two Birds by Flann O’Brien (1938)

At Swim Two Birds was more a book to be read as a concept than as a story for me. There is a story being written within the story and we are introduced to the three characters in the story being composed: Pooka MacPhellimey a devil, John Furriskey a character who emerges from the writing of the fictional writer Dermot Trellis, and adaptations of Irish legends mainly Finn Mac Cool and Mad King Sweeney. Yet, there are significant breaks where the writer introduces the writer of this story as a college student living with his bachelor uncle, rarely attending class, drinking stout with his buddies, and laying in bed. There is a strange, disjointed nature to the novel because of this back and forth between observation of the writer/narrator reality, for example pausing to describe the color of a persons suit or attitude, and the occasional glimpses into the story of the characters. As a concept I can appreciate the attempt to transcend the boundaries of the literary genre and the walls between the artist and the art. As a story I found the narrator/writer hard to care about and I can acknowledge that has a lot to do with my own culture. I thought the poetry of Mad King Sweeney was the best part of the work, but the characters themselves felt cardboard and not well developed and the plot never held my interest.

I struggled to make it through this relatively short novel because neither the plot nor characters were compelling to me. When the book was first published it had a few very positive reviews by famous authors but generally received cool reviews in publications and sold less than 240 copies before the unsold copies were incinerated during the bombing raids of England in 1940. This is a book that the readers who loved the work kept pushing it into republication and recommending it, but it also seems to be something that many readers fail to appreciate. I obviously am in the later group as a reader. I can appreciate the concept but as a story it fails for me.

Every book is not for every reader, and when a story fails for me, I often wonder what it is that makes me not the best reader of the book, particularly a book other intelligent readers have enjoyed. As I mentioned above, the character of the writer/narrator as a lazy individual who appears to do the minimum (although he achieves good test scores at the end) rubs hard against the Texas rugged individualism, Protestant work ethic, and persistent American optimism of a child of the 1970s. There is a vast cultural gap between the depressed economy of the 1930s and the lack of opportunity of that time and the time of my youth and I know that shapes a person. I appreciate that in At Swim Two Birds the author can probably use the narrator to be self-deprecating without lapsing completely into cynicism or nihilism.

Review of Animal Farm by George Orwell

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 5: Animal Farm by George Orwell (1946)

Animal Farm is George Orwell’s allegorical parable that portrays the events of the Russian Revolution of 1917 by telling the story of a farm that the animals drive off their human masters and rule themselves. It is a clever little story with the crafty pig Napoleon consolidating power over the Animal Farm, and even changing the commandments of animalism as he and his pig and dog minions establish control. By the end of the story the pigs who control the Animal Farm, renamed Manor Farm by the end, are indistinguishable from the humans from the surrounding farm. It is a poignant story about the loss of history in a dictatorship that controls the narratives, and the way idyllic communities can be corrupted by their leaders.

This short novella has endured well as both a story and a political commentary. Even without a direct connection to the Russian Revolution the parable graphically illustrates the proverb that “power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The use of animals who lack the literacy to critique the changes to the practice of animalism and the manipulation both the written records of the commandments and the revolutionary song the animals sing (the forbidding of the singing of the Beasts of England) continues to be a warning of the ability to manipulate the opinions of the population by controlling the media.

Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Review of Possession by A. S. Byatt

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 73: Possession by A. S. Byatt (1990)

S. Byatt’s Possession is exactly the type of treasure I hoped to discover when I embarked on reading through the Time Magazine top 100 novel list, a truly gorgeous work in its use of the English language, method of telling the story, and its truly rich characters. There were several times I would stop and remark how beautiful a poem, letter, or dialogue was. I could identify with almost all the characters in this book and see a portion of myself reflected in each of them. It is a novel of stories within stories that is often told by the imagined writing and correspondence between the characters. It begins when Roland Mitchell, an underemployed scholar of the fictional poet Randolph Henry Ash, discovers in a volume Ash used two drafts of a letter to an unknown woman. Roland retains the letter and begins his quest to discover who this unknown woman is and to see if their relationship, whatever it may be, sheds any light on the work of Ash. Once his investigation leads him to the poet Christabel LaMott he is introduced to Maud Bailey, a feminist scholar with a keen interest in LaMott both as a writer and as a distant relative. Together they discover a collection of letters between these two poets which leads them into a re-evaluation of the lives of both the poets the study and themselves as they both become captured in this quest to uncover the story of this previously unknown but highly impactful relationship. Although Roland and Maud have not published their discovery, rumors begin which also brings Maud’s former lover and scholar Fergus Wolf, English Ash scholar and Roland’s boss James Blackadder, American Ash scholar and collector Mortimer Cropper, American feminist and Cristabel LaMott scholar Leonora Stern, and a scholar who studied Ellen Ash, Randolph’s wife, Beatrice Nest into the pursuit of the correspondence, Maud and Roland who disappear for a time, and the truth of this previously unknown relationship.

Possession is a phenomenal story, but the creation of the poetry of both Randolph Henry Ash and Christabel LaMott as well as a beautiful set of letters between them is incredible. This was a joy to read. The narration evoked a rich sense of the people and the landscapes they encountered. Some of the best use of descriptive language I have ever read. The correspondence was frequently as poetic as the actual poems created and it made me wish I could read more of both poets. There were surprises all the way to the end of the book and I was awestruck with this incredible piece of literary artwork. I loved this book.

Review of Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

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Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Book 83: Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson (1992)

Snow Crash is a dystopic view into the future from the early 1990s when the internet was emerging to an imaginative world of a United States that has devolved into corporate, religious, and ethnic enclaves and the metaverse, the virtual world created by hackers and populated by avatars, becomes the escape from reality. Hiro Protagonist and Y.T. are the two primary protagonists that are navigating this chaotic world where they are exposed to a plot which threatens to grant control to all humanity to the mysterious L. Bob Rife and his religious front Reverend Wayne’s Pearly Gates. The plot moves from technological to religious to philological speculation about the original human language being similar to the binary language of computer language. Through infecting hackers who have learned the machine code and using their blood to create a drug which allows his followers to practice glossolalia, the Pentecostal practice of speaking in tongues which is also for the book the base language that was shattered in the story of Babylon. In a plot that involves the Central Intelligence Corporation (formerly CIA), the Mafia, Mr. Lee’s Greater Hong Kong (a multinational business franchise), the muscle bound and menacing Raven who carries his own nuclear device, the Raft (a conglomeration of ships centered around the U.S.S. Enterprise and a tanker) the plot is inventive if excessive.

Science Fiction is probably the toughest genre to write an enduring story within because as time passes the technology evolves in ways that can undercut the story’s credibility. Snow Crash is one of those rare novels where its concepts become the language of future technology: for example, the metaverse and the popularization of the term avatar. It also provided a fertile base for other works that would project a future where the metaverse becomes the escape from reality like Ready Player One. The religious and philological speculations were a part where, because of my background, I had trouble suspending my own knowledge to accept the premises of the novel and the devolution that the novel foresaw into commercialized interests thankfully never occurred in the United States in the way the book envisions. Yet, in the thirty years since the publication of this book there are areas where the author was accurate as we live in a time where they are beginning to construct an alternative reality and a corporation which rebranded itself Meta is one of the leading forces in creating this metaverse. Unfortunately, the book is accurate that there are many people who escape from the real world into the digital world and what was envisioned as a dystopic reality is at least partially being adopted as normal.

Review of the Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden

Sign of the Rose

Searchings: Sacred and Secular

Category Archives: Book Reviews

Review of The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones

Review of the Moviegoer by Walker Percy

A Review of A Passage to India by E. M. Foster

Review of Rabbit, Run by John Updike

Review of At Swim Two Birds by Flann O’Brien

Review of Animal Farm by George Orwell

Time Magazine Top 100 Novels

Review of Possession by A. S. Byatt

Review of Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson

Review of the Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden