Writing with the telegraphic swiftness and microscopic sensitivity that have made her one of our most distinguished journalists, Joan Didion create...
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May 03, 2010
astried
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Imagine looking at an artist at work. He begins with pencil sketch on an empty paper. Right now with a little imagination we can see what he’s trying to draw, that circle maybe the head, flowing line for hair, the outline of body, arm, feet. Then he picks up his pen. Our artist might decide to start from the face; he has a very clear image in his mind so he works straight away in detail. Eyes, nose, mouth, expression, face outline emerge. Next he moves his hand starting to give detail to locks o
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Jan 04, 2010
Matt
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If _Play It as It Lays_ was Didion doing Chandler, this is her version of a Graham Greene novel, whereby a sophisticated viewer in a small former colony (in this case the Latin American Boca Grande) learns that the naivete of a stranger is the proper way to encounter the world.
Here, the sophisticate is the American-born wife of a former dictator of Boca Grande, and the innocent abroad is Charlotte, mother of a girl gone radical terrorist in the sixties, who has washed up in Boca Gran More...
Here, the sophisticate is the American-born wife of a former dictator of Boca Grande, and the innocent abroad is Charlotte, mother of a girl gone radical terrorist in the sixties, who has washed up in Boca Gran More...
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Apr 06, 2011
Nora
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I like Joan Didion's non-fiction a lot, and have tried and failed to read Play It As It Lays in the past. Every character in this novel is miserable and depraved, all the time. You feel for them, because they're humans, but soon reading about such ugly behaviors gets old, and you start wanting all of them to shut up. I'm iffy about proclaiming the absolute value of realism, but I find it strikingly unrealistic that everyone is so totally unpleasant and nasty; there is no joy, ever. That's stupid
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Jul 30, 2010
Charles
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In some ways, similar to American Pastoral by Roth. Both with psychologically tormented protagonists, both with demented terrorist daughters. The drawback to A Book of Common Prayer is that Joan Didion's characters and narrator are lofty and bourgeoisie, but are also cold and hard to identify with. Charlotte Douglas is not as tormented nor driven as The Swede, and Marin never develops into a character with any substance, let alone the brilliance, like Merry's.
Maybe I am daft, but I d More...
Maybe I am daft, but I d More...
Jan 29, 2012
Mason
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First of all, despite the title, this is not a Christian book about praying and shit like that. It’s a novel about human dislocation and the intractability of delusion, set against the backdrop of Central American revolution. Didion is best known for her nonfiction, but I proselytize for her novels every chance I get.
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Oct 22, 2009
Sharonlee
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Wonderful book. Didion is a genius. It's interesting to read something that was written so long ago, it seems another lifetime--and yet I was alive when it was written. The times were a-changing and the world that they lived in was so very different from what it became by the time I was an adult.
At some point, I was struck by some similarities between this book and another book that I really loved, Bel Canto, by Ann Patchett. Neither is a real, named place (although Bel Canto see More...
At some point, I was struck by some similarities between this book and another book that I really loved, Bel Canto, by Ann Patchett. Neither is a real, named place (although Bel Canto see More...
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Mar 15, 2011
Adam
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I just, didn't get it. Yes, it's a eulogy and there's a lot going on and Charlotte was kind of a crack pot of a person and her life was a reflection of that, but, I just, didn't get it.
I was excited to read Didion's acclaimed fiction after having been passed an essay she wrote that I found particularly vivid. However, I was disappointed in her storytelling, which, honestly is likely only personal preference.
The past few novels I've read have been epic-realistic-tales. I go More...
I was excited to read Didion's acclaimed fiction after having been passed an essay she wrote that I found particularly vivid. However, I was disappointed in her storytelling, which, honestly is likely only personal preference.
The past few novels I've read have been epic-realistic-tales. I go More...
Dec 05, 2011
Caley
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Wow, this novel packs quite the punch. I finished it in one sitting. An absolutely smart and fresh look at the power dynamics at play in Latin America of the 70s. Didion's breezy and somehow nuanced portrayal of the elite, Californian female prototype is brilliant. Every character in this novel seemed so familiar, but yet so intricately built-up so as to be totally original. My only complaint is the frequent stand-alone sentences that are thrown out as complete paragraphs. Rang somewhat pretenti
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Jul 29, 2011
Jeff
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The first time I read this, the Latin American scenes stayed with me, but this time I was knocked out by the travelogue section set in the Deep South, which weirdly kept evoking moments from the banned Rolling Stones tourfilm 'Cocksucker Blues.' Then there's the great New Orleans dinner party scene, which is as vivid as anything in 'The Moviegoer.'
There's so many loaded cultural details packed into the prose and the story accumulates in such odd spasms that this isn't nearly as immedi More...
There's so many loaded cultural details packed into the prose and the story accumulates in such odd spasms that this isn't nearly as immedi More...
Jul 31, 2011
Ronald
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Grace Strasser-Mendana and Charlotte Douglas are two American women whose paths cross in their final days in the small Central American nation of Boca Grande. Though Grace exercises financial control over the ruling family of the nation, Charlotte falls victims to the machinations of the men of the family. A gripping minimalist account which presents some very shallow people in a very three-dimensional manner, and, in essence, a study of two very different manners in which women deal with the ve
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Nov 04, 2011
Jamie
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O, how I adore Didion. For whatever reason, found myself surprised that I also enjoyed a novel of hers. The prose itself is very "typical Didion," but the narrative itself strikes me as far stranger than her non-fiction. Seems Didion tends toward the penetrative (in the sense of cutting through the b.s., not whatever your dirty mind was going to in that damned gutter!), whereas this novel invested most of its energy in the unknowable. Charlotte Douglas is one of the most bizarre ch
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Jan 27, 2010
Saxon
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Didion's third novel revolves around two American women caught deeply within the under-developed and highly corrupt Latin American country of Boca Grande. One controls most of the country's wealth while the other has arrived as an "una tourista" hoping to be re-united with her estranged, revolutionary daughter. Greed abound, people die and are displaced. While Grace, the narrator, is left with uncertainties about the truth of various events that took place in Boca Grande.
Di More...
Di More...
Jun 18, 2008
Kirsten
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This is the second book I have recently read about American women in Central America - a prostitute in Nicaragua (The Stars at Noon) in 1984; and really, a solid example of an American prototype in the 1970s in A Book of Common Prayer set in Boca Grande, which is described to be somewhere in Central America - but seems to possibly be fictional? I don't know, every time I try to look it up, all I find is somewhere in Florida. I find it somewhat strange that I have managed to pick up two seemingly
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Nov 06, 2007
Beth
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I started reading Joan Didion about a year or two ago. I tend to prefer her non-fiction (The White Album being a favorite) to her fiction, but overall I just enjoy her writing style. Her style tends to be meandering, not quite stream-of-conscious and definitely not linear. That makes her extremely successful at evoking mood, amiance and a general sense of time (especially the writing that she did in the 60's). For that reason it almost doesn't matter what the subject matter is. Style become
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Jun 15, 2011
Rebecca SC
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This is one of my favorite books of all time. Joan Didion has an incredible way of crafting flawed yet accessible people, with incredibly beautiful and resonant language that is not overly complicated. She uses the words she needs to give you the ideas she has. I wish I still had the copy I read in college, marked with highlights and comments written on almost every page. I devoured this book, I didn't just read it, and many of her images and turns of phrase have lasted with me to this day.
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May 04, 2009
Nori
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Easily the most depressing thing I've read in years (with the possible exception of the collected stories of Amy Hempel, which, as the NYT review says, should not be read all in one go). Woman lives life barely connected to it, dissembles, is used, lives life of quiet desperation, eventually ends up in soul-crushing tropics to die.
I CAN'T FINISH IT. No really, I don't do this with books, but I'm stopping with 100 pages to go. Sorry, Charlotte, I just can't bring myself to see wh More...
I CAN'T FINISH IT. No really, I don't do this with books, but I'm stopping with 100 pages to go. Sorry, Charlotte, I just can't bring myself to see wh More...
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Aug 27, 2011
Tahia
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I'm still pondering this one..I don't think I quite "got it". I'm still trying to figure it out. It reminded me of Graham Greene novels, The Comedians. i think i was a little disappointed in this book after reading her non-fiction, A Year of Magical Thinking. I'm not sure I'm as drawn to Didion's fiction as her non-fiction but I am drawn to the way her mind works. So I plan to read all Didion writing I can get my hands on.
Dec 16, 2009
Steven
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I have not been the witness I wanted to be.
Charlotte Douglas, an American woman sojourning in ficitional Central American country of Boca Grande, is the focus of this book. Charlotte's beloved daughter Marin has run off with a group of Marxist radicals and taken part in an absurd act of terrorism, and in the wake of her daughter's disappearance Charlotte's marriage to a crusading Berkeley lawyer (not Marin's father), has fallen apart.
Charlotte is a bit silly and divorced More...
Charlotte Douglas, an American woman sojourning in ficitional Central American country of Boca Grande, is the focus of this book. Charlotte's beloved daughter Marin has run off with a group of Marxist radicals and taken part in an absurd act of terrorism, and in the wake of her daughter's disappearance Charlotte's marriage to a crusading Berkeley lawyer (not Marin's father), has fallen apart.
Charlotte is a bit silly and divorced More...
Sep 03, 2009
Chauncey
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spoiled vacuous lost souls captured perfectly mirrored in a stunning stylishness and a wierdness many of the more popular indie filmmakers of the 90s and 00s have tried so hard for but never come close to. joan didion is cool as a cucumber. the end left me with the need to discuss. maybe i'll go back and finally finish play it as it lays which felt like a stungun of depression when i first got a hold of it.
Jan 17, 2012
Sarah
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This was a re-read for me this year. A Book of Common Prayer was the first of Didion's novels that I read and it is certainly my favourite. I particularly enjoy the way Didion employs the cultural differences between Boca Grande and the United States. This novel is quintessential Didion and I liked it even more upon this re-read.
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Dec 23, 2011
Courtney
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Excellent. I love Didion's style--a sort of fragmentary, post-modern journalism told with a voice that is definitively hers--and I thought that this was a gripping story, beautifully told. This is the first of Didion's fiction that I've read (though I love her non-fiction) and I'll definitely read more.
Sep 20, 2009
Caroline
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There's smthing icy and vivisecting about Didion's non-fiction that doesn't translate to fiction. I wanted to read one of her novels and picked this up for the Year of Magical Thinking passages that described writing... I never enjoyed it.
Also, Latin America -- super en vogue in the 70s or what? On to Cameron's City of Final Destination, which also traipses all around the southern continent.
Also, Latin America -- super en vogue in the 70s or what? On to Cameron's City of Final Destination, which also traipses all around the southern continent.
Nov 01, 2011
Cschuft
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Joan Didion is classic. Always worth reading.
Here is a story of two women, two lives, out in the world. One woman, the observer, calm, settled, wise, perhaps because she is financially and politically secure. The other, the observed, scattered, and vulnerable, perhaps because her approach to life is to put a positive spin on whatever happens.
I found really interesting the segment of the story describing travels through the North American South.
Here is a story of two women, two lives, out in the world. One woman, the observer, calm, settled, wise, perhaps because she is financially and politically secure. The other, the observed, scattered, and vulnerable, perhaps because her approach to life is to put a positive spin on whatever happens.
I found really interesting the segment of the story describing travels through the North American South.
Dec 30, 2008
Jlou
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Not an easy book to summarize or describe. What I like about this book is the way the characters voices and the narrative action are drawn out in a subtle way, she almost has to wait for you to catch up. "Showing" you the story rather than "telling" you the story.
Aug 29, 2010
Simone
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the writing is amazing, really sucks you in. hard to summarize. the narrator is a very cynical middle aged woman who is terminally ill...the story line is very 70s (someone's kid is a weather-underground type). quick summer paperback read.
Feb 04, 2011
Caitlin
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Absolutely lovely.
Joan Didion writes the way I think. It was so easy to read, yet the thoughts it provoked were so complex. It was haunting. The words, the thoughts, the characters.
I loved it.
Joan Didion writes the way I think. It was so easy to read, yet the thoughts it provoked were so complex. It was haunting. The words, the thoughts, the characters.
I loved it.
Oct 12, 2011
Christopher
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I am not always a fan of Didion's fiction, but this book was exceptional. Warren Bogart is one of the ugliest characters I have ever read, and I mean that as a compliment.
Jan 23, 2011
Jessica
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I can appreciate the interesting structure and point-of-view of the novel, but the story itself wasn't as moving as most of her writing usually is. I liked it! A quick read, and another check as I continue through Didion's works.
Sep 21, 2009
Carol
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Having read The Year of Magical Thinking I wanted to read a book of her fiction. It took me a bit to get used to her writing style. The overall story was dark and brooding.
Dec 06, 2011
Lauren
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Joan Didion writes in such a way that the reading experience actually simulates the neuroses of her characters. It's virtual reality. It's unsettling. It's incredible.
