by B. Traven
Started: May 30, 2010
Finished: June 1, 2010
Traven's dry, matter-of-fact style suits this story perfectly. My only gripes are minor ones. First, the great John Huston film based on this book follows it so closely even in most of the tiny details that it made reading it slightly anti-climactic. Second, the couple of chapters dealing with Indian and bandit lore seemed like pulp filler to a degree. Still, I really enjoyed this overall. 308 pages. Grade: A-
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This Boy's Life
by Tobias Wolff
Started: May 30, 2010
Finished: June 3, 2010
Judging solely from a couple of tiny clips of the movie version that I'd seen years ago, I thought this was going to be a depressing tale of a good kid getting the tar beat out of him by his sadistic stepfather. The reality was so much better. I love how honest Wolff is in describing what a dishonest sneaky little bastard he was as a kid. And Dwight, the stepfather, is a captivating character that could only come from real life. 288 pages. Grade: A
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Total # of Books Read in 2010: 172
Total # of Pages Read in 2010: 43,598
