false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1167098194m/18864.jpg 18864 24 "Disgusting as he usually was," Hunter Thompson writes in this, his 1959 novel, "on rare occasions he showed flashes of a stagnant intelligence. But his brain was so rotted with drink and dissolute living that whenever he put it to work it behaved like an old engine that had gone haywire from being dipped in lard." Surprise! Thompson isn't writing about himself, but one of the other, older, aimlessly carousing newspapermen in Puerto Rico, a guy called Moberg whose chief achievement is the ability to find his car after a night's drinking because it stinks so much. (I can smell it for blocks, he boasts.) The autobiographical hero, Paul Kemp, is 30, trapped in a dead-end job (Thompson wound up writing for a bowling magazine), and feeling as if his big-time writer dreams, soaked in Fitzgerald and Hemingway, are evaporating as rapidly as the rum in his fist.<p> In fact, Thompson was only 22 when he wrote <I>The Rum Diary</I>, but his fear of winding up like Moberg was well founded. What saved him was the fantastic conflagration of the 1960s, a fiery wind on which the reptilian wings of his prose style could catch and soar to the cackling heights of <I>Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas</I>. Puerto Rico in 1959 doesn't have bad craziness enough to offer Thompson--just a routine drunken-reporter stomping by local cops and a riot over Kemp's friend's temptress girlfriend, a scantily imagined Smith College alumna who likes to strip nude on beaches and in nightclubs to taunt men.<p> Thompson's prose style only intermittently takes tentative flight--compare the stomping scenes in this book with his breakthrough, <i>Hell's Angels</i>--but it's interesting to see him so nakedly reveal his sensitive innards, before the celebrated clownish carapace grew in. It's also interesting to see how he improved this full version of the novel from the more raw (and racist) excerpts found in the 1990 collection <I>Songs of the Doomed</I> (available on audiocassette, partly narrated by Thompson). <I>--Tim Appelo</I> 69675 1998 The Rum Diary: A Novel total:5052|5:1417|4:2041|3:1309|2:252|1:33| 5052 19713 6591 439 2 2 false false Tue Aug 26 07:09:23 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 27 11:11:39 -0700 2008 more...]]> 2 2 false false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Thu Dec 27 10:38:12 -0800 2007 Thu Dec 27 10:38:42 -0800 2007 more...]]> 0 2 false false Sun Jun 28 17:12:40 -0700 2009 Fri Jul 17 12:28:46 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 2 false true Sat Jun 27 06:50:59 -0700 2009 Thu Jul 16 11:11:55 -0700 2009
I shared a vagrant optimism that some of us were making real progress, that we had taken an honest road, and that the best of us would inevitably make it over the t...more...]]> 5 1 false true Sat Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2000 Fri Oct 05 08:58:56 -0700 2007 Wed Jan 23 18:33:37 -0800 2008 Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72) It is largely autobiographical and there are flashes of gonzo, but perhaps the most surprising thing is the romance and tenderness with which the characters are drawn. The book...more...]]> 4 1 false false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Sun Aug 19 20:41:11 -0700 2007 Fri Aug 24 22:00:45 -0700 2007 more...]]> 3 0 false false Wed Feb 18 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Wed Feb 18 16:29:31 -0800 2009 Wed Feb 18 16:32:55 -0800 2009 more...]]> 5 1 false false Wed Jul 08 11:26:04 -0700 2009 Wed Jul 08 11:51:41 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Jan 29 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 03 19:51:11 -0800 2009 Tue Feb 03 19:52:46 -0800 2009 more...]]> 3 1 false false Mon Jun 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Jun 08 22:58:08 -0700 2009 Wed Jun 17 13:18:28 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Fri Sep 11 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 02 17:13:20 -0700 2009 Sun Sep 13 10:55:15 -0700 2009
The first Thompson book I read was the oh-so-popular "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" mainly because I love learning about the drug culture. I had hear...more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Dec 14 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sun Nov 30 08:28:24 -0800 2008 Sun Dec 14 11:56:40 -0800 2008 ...more...]]> 3 1 false false Thu Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2004 Wed Aug 01 09:18:06 -0700 2007 Fri Aug 03 08:58:33 -0700 2007 more...]]> 0 0 false false Sun Jul 10 00:00:00 -0700 2005 Thu May 21 13:54:35 -0700 2009 Thu May 21 13:55:15 -0700 2009


The STOP SMILING Downfall of American Publishing Issue dedicates 40 pages to an oral history of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, which includes interviews with collaborators and friends such as Ralph Steadman, Craig Vetter, wife Anita Thompson, PJ O'Rourke, and more.

About the i...more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Aug 11 11:40:21 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 11 11:49:35 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Fri Apr 10 14:00:09 -0700 2009 Fri Apr 10 14:10:05 -0700 2009 I enjoyed this book. Not particularly action-packed, and I could see how if one was actually read...more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Aug 18 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 17 17:57:57 -0700 2009 Tue Aug 18 01:42:27 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Tue Sep 08 12:50:02 -0700 2009 Tue Sep 08 12:56:48 -0700 2009 more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon Mar 23 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Sun Mar 22 19:34:39 -0700 2009 Mon Mar 23 10:24:56 -0700 2009 more...]]> 3 0 false false Mon Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Fri Dec 12 06:58:49 -0800 2008 Sun Jun 21 19:26:15 -0700 2009 The Rum Diary and I'm happy I did. It’s a delightful, quick read. The story line though simple was very engaging. You can see in the young Hunter, who started The Rum Diary when only 22, the makings of a great writer. I occasio...more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=18864