GREAT BOOKS:

For a guy like me, it is impossible to proclaim what was/is your favorite novel. This is kind of like stating what is your favorite food. Well hell, one day I might want a corn dog and the next day I might want a fried bologna sandwich on Wonder Bread. Who the hell knows. Anna Karenina might be my favorite novel of all time, it certainly is the greatest love story I’ve ever read. If it does not move you then your heart is about the size of the Grinch’s before he met Lil Mary Sue Hoo. ( By the way, I fancy myself to me a modern day Count Vronsky). I loved the character of Levin, who was of course autobiographical. The scene when he takes in the Harvest with the serfs was down right mystical, it is as if the serfs sprung right out of the ground. This is an AWESOME FRIGGIN BOOK.

All true Southerners Love To Kill A Mockingbird. In some salons of sophistry, it is considered a children’s book, but it is much, much more. I have heard it said, that no one can speak Russian without a trace of a foreign tongue unless they are native Russians. Likewise, I think no one can really understand the South and love it for the reasons we do, other than native Southerners. My two daughters without any coaxing from me both declare this to be their favorite novel. ( We must have done a good job with their “raisin”). Ella and Sally “get” the whole “southern sense of place.” I am damn proud of their good judgment.

There is something about those crazy Russians that just grabs you. Winston Churchill said Russia is “a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.” In a sense, that’s what makes this Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov so great. To me, it also had a sense of Arthurian wonderment, this is a Russia, a great Russia coming into its own that was obliterated by Communism. I love the scene, at a tavern, in a provincial town, far from Moscow, snow falling outside, and the philosophical, indeed soulful dialogue of these crazy Russians. Despite the rich tapestry of characters and personalities, which makes the book great by itself, this fundamentally is a book about God, man and the Devil. The scene where Ivan confronts the devil is bone chilling, and very, very real. No one but a damn Russian could write this book. The characters are amazing, all of who have their own souls. Wow.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS: I think of Hemingway and Fitzgerald in the same breath, primarily because both were all in Paris together during the “Movable Feast” days. I fancy myself hanging out with them, drinking an Absinthe at Deux Maggots.

Tender Is The Night and the Sun Also Rises are tremendous literary works from this time. Hemingway wrote a bunch more.  “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” is another favorite of mine. The Spanish Civil War, think about that, which side would you have been on…, it is a hell of a lot more complicated than the movies…..

MORE REVIEWS ON THEIR WAY…..