I thought I was completely unfamiliar with this story as I had not seen the movie nor did I know anything about the book. However, it turns out that I have indeed seen a similar movie, Dave! It turns out that story has been used over and over again by various people. I don’t know …
Category: Fiction
King Solomon’s Mines (1888) by H. Rider Haggard
I was only familiar with this story from the ’80s Hollywood version, which I had been told was drastically different from the book. Sure enough, it absolutely was. So much of it is utterly different as to be (nearly) a different story. But anyway…
The Partner (1997) by John Grisham
I only know Grisham from the old days when his novels were constantly turned into “event movies” – or the closest thing we had to those back in the ’90s. I watched many of them, though not every one, and, at least as a teenager, thoroughly enjoyed a couple of them, particularly A Time to …
Oliver Twist (1839) by Charles Dickens
Two different reviews!
Lucky Jim (1954) by Kingsley Amis
Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis is a laugh-out-loud novel about what it’s like to feel like a fraud teaching at a university – something I can sort of relate to – while you hate your (sort of) girlfriend, hate your boss, hate your subject matter and generally hate your life – and that hate manifests …
Things Fall Apart (1959) by Chinua Achebe
I love the slow burn of this. Putting aside its importance – isn’t it one of the first major novels by an actual African, if not the first? – I love how this unfolds: you have no idea the real crisis until well into the book. This is just begging for a movie adaptation. But …
The Ponder Heart (1953) by Eudora Welty
I’d like to believe that all my favourite funny things – Python, Kids In The Hall, Mr. Show, and numerous others – transcend time and place, and are objectively funny. I know that’s not true, as tons of people don’t like Python, for example. But I’d like to believe. And I’d like to believe it …
The Essential Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1995) edited by Leonard Wolf
This is an immense edition of what is otherwise a pretty short novella. It is nice that a story like this would get this kind of treatment, but it’s kind of over the top. For example, the novella itself is rather over-annotated. How is that possible, you ask? Well, even one of the footnotes has …
The Grapes of Wrath (1939) by John Steinbeck
It just so happens that I started to watch Ken Burns’ The Dustbowl just as I finished this book, and contrasting the two approaches is illustrative. It’s interesting that Steinbeck makes no mention of the man-made nature of the disaster, even though he knew it was man-made. I suspect this is to help further create …
Call it Sleep (1934) by Henry Roth
I have finally finished Call it Sleep by Henry Roth, but it isn’t just the book’s fault – at least some of the responsibility lies with our new puppy who, especially in November, did not leave me with enough energy to read. Anyway, I’m finally done and I’m glad I read it.
1934 (1983, Farrar Straus Giroux) by Alberto Moravia
I have written before about my love-hate relationship with Italian movies. But I can’t say that I have had this same experience with Italian literature, at least until now. Until now, I have genuinely liked the few Italian novels and short stories I have gotten my hands on. It seemed to me that what I …
The Bostonians by Henry James (1886)
I haven’t fallen in love in the teenage / young adult sense in some time. The last time I was 26 I think. But that being said, I still think I have a good idea of what it is like.
Invisible Man (1952) by Ralph Ellison
As a white Canadian born in the last quarter of the 20th century, I do not know in any way shape or form what it means to be a Black American – or any other oppressed minority in a European-derived country – but I think perhaps this is the closest I will ever get to …
The Big Money (1936) by John Dos Passos
Whereas I found Nineteen Nineteen to be a significant improvement on the first book, The Big Money feels like he has lapsed back into his bad habits, and he gets confused between the form and the storytelling. He is still writing reasonably compelling stories but he can’t decide whether he wants to tell one person’s …