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123rd out of 253 books
—
399 voters
The Hemingway Hoax
by
Joe Haldeman
John Baird had not expected to be killed.
The accepted academic penalty for literary forgery is academic disgrace. Which was why Hemingway scholar Baird, tempted by looming financial disaster and a plausible conman, had not anticipated death at the hands of an interdimensional literary critic. Still less had he been prepared to be pursued and killed through alternative worl...more
The accepted academic penalty for literary forgery is academic disgrace. Which was why Hemingway scholar Baird, tempted by looming financial disaster and a plausible conman, had not anticipated death at the hands of an interdimensional literary critic. Still less had he been prepared to be pursued and killed through alternative worl...more
Mass Market Paperback, 160 pages
Published
April 1st 1991
by Avon Books
(first published 1990)
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Sep 27, 2010
Kemper
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
sci-fi,
alt-universes
I like this book, but I still can’t believe that I can be this confused after just 160 pages.
Joe Haldeman’s FAQ at his website says that the subtitle of the book is A Short Comic Novel of Existential Terror. That describes it about as well as anything I could come up with. Haldeman also states that: “It may be the most literary of my books, but it also has the most explicit sex and the most gruesome violence I’ve ever written. Nobody will be bored by it.” And he’s absolutely right about that on...more
Joe Haldeman’s FAQ at his website says that the subtitle of the book is A Short Comic Novel of Existential Terror. That describes it about as well as anything I could come up with. Haldeman also states that: “It may be the most literary of my books, but it also has the most explicit sex and the most gruesome violence I’ve ever written. Nobody will be bored by it.” And he’s absolutely right about that on...more
9 likes · like · see review
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The novel starts out well; I was intrigued by the hoax scheme and enjoyed the details of conspiring, the gathering of information, the planning of the hoax itself. However, the hoax itself was dropped when the temporal agent appeared - and the book started to go downhill and have lost its point... if it ever had one. The main character goes onto darker and darker sexual and violent exploits; there seems no point; it seems to be self-serving. There is nothing to be learned; there is no good story...more
What intrigues readers and Hemingway fans so much about the manuscripts lost in Paris in 1922? Hemingway was so obsessed with that episode---his wife at the time, Hadley claims they were stolen---he wrote about it some 40 years later in his posthumously published memoir A Moveable Feast, and the story was recently retold in Paula McLain's The Paris Wife.
Scholars, biographers and novelists have speculated about the what-could-have-beens if those manuscripts were somehow to surface. It's a questio...more
Scholars, biographers and novelists have speculated about the what-could-have-beens if those manuscripts were somehow to surface. It's a questio...more
3.5 or so stars. I read the novella version. Oddly, isfdb.org tells me the novel version is "slightly expanded" from the novella - yet it also tells me the novella won best novella for both Hugo & Nebula, but the novel version didn't win any kind of award. Maybe, there just wasn't as much novella competition that year.
The entities who protect the parallel universes from events that will harm numerous universe have for some reason decided they must stop a professor from trying to fool the wor...more
The entities who protect the parallel universes from events that will harm numerous universe have for some reason decided they must stop a professor from trying to fool the wor...more
A bizarre and fascinating book, that features time-travel and parallel worlds without making your head explode too often.
It's all very straight forward, three people plot to create a lost Hemingway manuscript, the Eternals get involved to stop the world from being destroyed only things don't go as anyone planned.
But really it's a bit weird as one character retains their memories as they die and shifts in to a parallel world that's slightly different. You saw The Butterfly Effect right? And as th...more
It's all very straight forward, three people plot to create a lost Hemingway manuscript, the Eternals get involved to stop the world from being destroyed only things don't go as anyone planned.
But really it's a bit weird as one character retains their memories as they die and shifts in to a parallel world that's slightly different. You saw The Butterfly Effect right? And as th...more
12 likes · like · see review
Originally posted at FanLit.
http://www.fantasyliterature.com/revi...
While on vacation in Key West, John Baird, a Hemingway scholar, meets a conman named Castle in a bar. After telling Castle about Hemingway’s missing manuscript, Castle suggests that they forge it and make a lot of money. Baird refuses, of course, but Castle enlists Baird’s wife Lena and the two of them talk John into creating a forgery. Under pressure from his wife and his rapidly dwindling finances, John goes along with the pla...more
http://www.fantasyliterature.com/revi...
While on vacation in Key West, John Baird, a Hemingway scholar, meets a conman named Castle in a bar. After telling Castle about Hemingway’s missing manuscript, Castle suggests that they forge it and make a lot of money. Baird refuses, of course, but Castle enlists Baird’s wife Lena and the two of them talk John into creating a forgery. Under pressure from his wife and his rapidly dwindling finances, John goes along with the pla...more
I read A Farewell to Arms in high school, and quite hated it. Hemmingway's style never engaged my teenager's eye. But it's impossible to escape Papa's influence.
John Baird, a professor specializing in Hemmingway, in a conversation with shifty man named Castle, speculates that the "lost" Hemmingway writings could bring in a fortune if forged. Castle senses money, and the two of them hash out a way to legally forge a "found" Hemmingway novel. Never mind that some academics' reputations could be ru...more
John Baird, a professor specializing in Hemmingway, in a conversation with shifty man named Castle, speculates that the "lost" Hemmingway writings could bring in a fortune if forged. Castle senses money, and the two of them hash out a way to legally forge a "found" Hemmingway novel. Never mind that some academics' reputations could be ru...more
I like Parallel worlds story and this is the right one. The story effectively employs the structure of continuity between John from one world to another (parallel) world without losing memory in the past world. The structure is enhanced by John's special ability of no-forgetting. I would like to read other works of this kind.
I really didn't like this. One, I've never read anything by Hemingway nor do I want to, so I wasn't that interested in the story to began with ; two bits of this where way too gory for me; and three the ending made no sense, it didn't answer the questions raised in the rest of the story and it was confusing.
This universe-hopping sci-fi thriller kept me interested until the very end. A sad-sack Hemingway scholar and a con man meet cute in a Key West bar and hatch a plan to make up *the* missing manuscript (the loss of which wife Hadley was so vilified – see The Paris Wife by Paula McClain).
Their dreams of fame and fortune are cut short by a being from another dimension who tries everything to stop them. Apparently, Hemingway’s idea of true manhood is irreparably damaged by this and it screws up the...more
Their dreams of fame and fortune are cut short by a being from another dimension who tries everything to stop them. Apparently, Hemingway’s idea of true manhood is irreparably damaged by this and it screws up the...more
Maybe I'm just a Haldeman/Hemingway fan, and the literary references and ideas in here sent me into paroxysms of glee. But it's also a good book. I mean, I think.
Average, however, I usually do not red fiction so it may just be that I have boring reading preferences.
This was a quick diversion - light and easy to read, with a good central character and fast paced plot.
Parallel worlds and an attempt to forge Hemingway's lost manuscripts. Slight novel but amusing.
Sep 23, 2010
Craig J.
added it
Hemingway Hoax by Joe Haldeman (1991)
An interesting idea and well executed...
L O V E D it!
Fun, little book. Hemingway scholar attempts to recreate H's early style and forge one of H's lost stories. Great concept...then there's the sci-fi, multiple-dimensions of probability (many of which are explored). The story had a strong enough concept that the sci-fi element sort of interferes with it and slows it down unnecessarily. Quick read in the cold with a few cups of coffee...really hit the spot.
A short tale of a writer trying to create a false Hemingway book and the repercussions of that. Quick read, but all of Haldeman's books are for me since I really enjoy them.
Loved the book until I got to the end. Horrible ending, but a great story for the first 90% of the book.
Strange enough to knock it down to 3 stars, but interesting enough to stay there.
Jun 07, 2013
Ronny
added it
Jun 01, 2013
Cillian McGillycuddy
marked it as to-read
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Brother of Jack C. Haldeman II
Haldeman is the author of 20 novels and five collections. The Forever War won the Nebula, Hugo and Ditmar Awards for best science fiction novel in 1975. Other notable titles include Camouflage, The Accidental Time Machine and Marsbound as well as the short works "Graves," "Tricentennial" and "The Hemingway Hoax." Starbound is scheduled for a January release. SFWA pres...more
More about Joe Haldeman...
Haldeman is the author of 20 novels and five collections. The Forever War won the Nebula, Hugo and Ditmar Awards for best science fiction novel in 1975. Other notable titles include Camouflage, The Accidental Time Machine and Marsbound as well as the short works "Graves," "Tricentennial" and "The Hemingway Hoax." Starbound is scheduled for a January release. SFWA pres...more
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