Deb, Roth's "I Married A Communist" is really good, and he surprised me too. It's political, not about The Sex..but that's not surprising...this one had a twist, too. So, yes, my literary crush list now has a 70+ category.

(adding "...Columnist" to reading list) He lost me for years with "The Breast", though.

Right now, in the middle of a Simenon binge, I'm reading a complegtely chilling novel that I read years ago and couldn't find until recently. It's not a Maigret - it's called "The Man Who Watched the Trains Go By" and its the story of how one event - in this case, the man losing his job and being deked by his employer over it - cracks the outer veneer of civilised family man and solid citizen off this Dutch man, and lets the monster inside out.

You know what's nice? Reading a book at nearly fifty that blew your mind as a teenager, and finding that it holds up, on every level.

Reading a book at nearly fifty that blew your mind as a teenager, and finding that it holds up, on every level.

Yeah. So many of mine are no longer even readable.

Let me just say that popularity with people on public transportation does not equal literary respect.

Jesse, can I tag this?

"Communist", babe. As in Red. Know what you mean about the Breast thing...it's Nathan Zuckerman badfic. So, I guess he ficced himself....

Yeah. So many of mine are no longer even readable.

What I find with a lot of my favourites from those years is that I notice things I didn't notice then. It makes me blink that at age 13, I didn't notice what a total anti-semite Georgette Heyer was, or Dorothy Sayers, for that matter. I know that part of it was the split on that side of my family (accustomed to it, I mean), but somehow my brain never registered anything from either author except a sort of vague Anglican condescension.

Read them now? WHOA. They are all compact of their class of wealthy well-educated first half of the century C of E girls, they are. Tories to the nines.

"Communist", babe

(blinking)

Jeepers, I typed "columnist." This is what I get for having Paul Krugman open in another browser window.

Ha.I'm glad he's moved on. Adultery isn't as funny as it used to be, chez moi. And the Breast? Is like one of those ideas you get when you're being goofy with your friends or something, but you're supposed to get over it the next day. I have those. But till I read that, I didn't know famous writers did too. Somebody should have done the "cruel-to-be-kind" thing and torn that up.

Jesse, can I tag this?

Hee! Of course!

excellent