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.The Great Gatsby
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: F. Scott Fitzgerald

September 30, 1999
I read this book because I'm trying to read a lot of the classics on the various "Top 100" book lists floating around out there. This book is on most of the lists so I added it to my list of books to read. Having never seen a movie adaptation either, I knew absolutely nothing about the story before I read it. I recognize that this book is beautifully written. I was amazed at the way Fitzgerald created art with words. However, the story itself did nothing for me. I realize that it was a story about shallow people living shallow lives but I finished it with the thought "Is that all there is?" I wanted somebody to get some comeuppence or something. I'll rate it a four for the art of the words alone.
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.Revolutionary Road
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Richard Yates

April 25, 2000
As several others have noted, if you like the show Mad Men you'd probably be interested in reading Revolutionary Road. However, this novel makes Mad Men look like Happy Days (but let's hope Mad Men doesn't jump the shark!) It's pretty damned dark. Written in 1961, it starkly portrays a not-so-young suburban couple completely disaffected with their lovely house, comfortable income, adoring friends, affable neighbors, easygoing bosses, unbelievably well-behaved kids, and unprecedented Postwar American peace and prosperity. (Presumably they also have problems with mid-century modern architecture, cool jazz, early rock-and-roll, and a new Alfred Hitchcock movie every year. What a drag.) So disgusted with the godawful daily grind of living ... Read More:
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.To Kill a Mockingbird
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Harper Lee

October 11, 1988
it was all great the shipping was fast the price was just right loved it
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.Fahrenheit 451
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Ray Bradbury

August 12, 1987
This book was a journey through the future of what our world turned in to. Guy Montag was a firefighter, but instead of putting out fires, they started them. In their world books were illegal and anyone who had them in their home would be removed and their house would be burned. Montag has burned many houses, but this one burning really struck him and he took a good look at reality. He never noticed the importance of books and goes through many, many adventures you'll just have to read for yourself.

I personally don't like science fiction, but this book really grabbed my attention. At the beginning it was a little difficult to understand what was going on and it was hard getting into the story, but as you read on everything starts to fall into place and make ... Read More:
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.The Catcher in the Rye
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: J.D. Salinger

January 30, 2001
I don't see how so many people rated this book so highly. I spent precious time reading this, that I'll never get back. If you want to waste your time reading about some stupid, snotty kid's boring experience in New York, then go ahead, read it. This book is not a classic and all copies should be burned out of existence, they really should.
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.Atlas Shrugged
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Ayn Rand

August 01, 1999
I read that book about seven years ago because I was intensely curious about Ayn Rand and her books. So many people waiting for the bus or riding one seemed to be into her books so I bought a hardback edition and started reading it. I could not stop reading it and turning the pages. When I came to the last page, I was so terribly disappointed that the marvellous story had to come to the end. I WANTED MORE!!!

That book made me see how the material value is determined and how it is diminished by the intensive governmental intervention as well as the corporate interference.

The strong parallel between the society as depicted in the 1957 book and the society in reality is astoundingly accurate. You owe it to yourself to read this book as to understand the financial ... Read More:
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.Slaughterhouse-Five
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Kurt Vonnegut

January 12, 1999
This is a book I'd always put off reading because of the title. I couldn't figure out what it meant, and it sounded too weird for me. In fact it is more literal than I imagined: it refers to five army personnel who survive the bombing of Dresden by taking shelter in a slaughterhouse.
It must have seemed a very clever book back when it was written, some 40 years ago now, but all the time-travel and general avant-garde story-telling is so mainstream today that it hardly registers.
In other words, the impact has lessened, and it's probably even dated a little. I don't want to be too harsh, though. This is a very powerful work, and once you know for sure that the author's own experiences were the catalyst, you can't fail to be moved as the novel moves towards its astonishing climax. ... Read More:
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.1984 (Signet Classics)
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: George Orwell

January 01, 1961
1984 has come and gone but this still is one of the most important books you could read about why it's important to protect our Freedom. Orwell wrote it to condemn Stalin and the Bolshevists but power for the sake of Power happens everywhere the government gets too strong and controls your life. Keep this in mind this coming November. Especially if your going to vote for a long lanky mackdaddy Chicago politician.
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.The Stranger
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Albert Camus

March 13, 1989
(This is a review of the Matthew Ward translation; black an dwhite cover)

This is a newish translation, done by an American rather than the British translation that had previously been the only English version of this French classic. It seems Camus was heavily influenced by American literature of the period -- Hemmingway, Faulkner and others -- and had written The Stranger, the first half especially, to reflect those stylistic sensibilities. The translator argues in his forward that much of that was lost in the British translation. And so here, it is restored.

The result is a matter-of-fact tone more in keeping with our unlikable protagonist, the distant, somewhat bitter Meursault. His almost emotionless life and anti-social tone are stark and ugly, traits that drag him beneath the waves when ... Read More:
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.Catch-22
City Travel Guides > Books > Classics
by: Joseph Heller

September 04, 1996
In my quest to read every "classic" work in history (seriously) I came across this supposed great work by Heller.

I always wonder what I am missing when the jacket calls the contents "hilarious" and hundreds of pages in, I have failed to ever crack a smile.

It's the type of novel (like Ulysses) that I truly believe most people "like" because they think they should, rather than based on it's actual contents.

It's absurd, fine. And??? The characters are relentlessly stupid and I never felt, for a second, like I would ever want to have to do with them.

Yossarian dumps his bombs willy nilly (of course, nobody ever questions that he might be dropping them on civilians or that the bombers might have to go back to do the job he failed to, and thus present more risk to his fellow ... Read More:
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