Title: The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
Author: Carson McCullers
Publisher: Bantam Books
Genre: Fiction
Length: 307 pages
The first half of the book blew me away. Carson McCullers was a genius… a prodigy in my mind for those first hundred and fifty pages.
I think I disappointed my book club members, though, because after that halfway mark I started to seriously lose interest.
What we have here is circumstantial reading. I’m 99% certain that I had way too much going on this last week with the May the Fourth Be With You Event at Half Price Books in Humble (see previous post) and stayed up waaaaaaaaaaaaay too late too many nights in a row to truly enjoy Mick and her little gang of misfits on the outer edges of society.
When I sleepy read, I get a little cranky. Doctor Copeland started to piss me off. Jake became a burden. I started to feel endeared to lazy Antonapoulos because he was fabulously lazy and I, too, wanted to laze around and sleep the day away. Only Singer remains as he should, a tragically romantic icon.
Words to the wise: Don’t read this tired, but definitely read it. Also, my book clubbers make the most fabulous pies.
Things you should be sure to read prior to tackling McCullers: Thorstein Veblen’s Conspicuous Consumption and Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto. Trust me, they are handy source documents to have under your belt and filed away in your brain anyway.
I am currently reading February House by Sherill Tippins. Very insightful into the life of McCullers and worth any reader’s while.
Now this sleepy reader is over and out.
