I do think class is as much an American focus as race, although race is clearly not a focus anywhere else.

Yet class in America is inextricably intertwined with money, more so (I think) than elsewhere. I'd also add a 3rd Great American Focus, religion, which also plays out in a way different than elsewhere.

I'll argue for Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy. It isn't on that list. But class/money determines almost the entire plot, with more than a passing discussion of the effect of religion.

Oh, and Moby Dick is overrated. The treatise on whaling breaks into the plot too deeply.

although race is clearly not a focus anywhere else

I don't understand what this means. What is the anywhere else?

I should have said almost, I guess. Race isn't a big focus in historical British literature, or most European literature, unless I'm completely wrong. And I absolutely could be. I just couldn't think of examples that address it the way Huck Finn and other American literature does.

When British literature touches the colonies (and unsurprisingly my reading is skewed thusly) it is reasonably often a big deal. And when it's not it is therefore in hindsight, because it takes a lot of work to ignore that shit. I think of Kipling and Achebe and Stevenson and Defoe when I think of the genre.

That's a bunch of people I never really read. So, like I said, if I'm wrong, I apologize.

I'm reading Divergent by Veronica Roth right now and from the first chapter, the book has me hooked. I'm about 60% of the way right now (can you tell I'm reading on a Kindle?) and my early affection for the book is a bit more muted, but I'm still hooked.

I find the events of the book pretty realistic (and periodically horrifying) given Roth's world-building.

For those who liked Hunger Games, I recommend it.

I read that and REALLY liked it. The sequel (Insurgent) is pretty good, too, and sets up the last book in the trilogy (which I think is supposed to be out in October) really well.

Yep, I really enjoyed the first two in that series as well. I liked the fact that Roth resists the Hunger Games temptation to make the female protagonist a bleak, empty shell of herself as the story progresses.

I've been wondering whether those books were good since they seem to be the new Hunger Games in terms of popularity and getting a movie made out of them. I may check them out once the whole trilogy's done.

I almost didn't read a EW article on the movie because it was so Next Hunger Games, but the pictures did really look fun.