In My Son, My Son, Howard Spring takes the Biblical tale of King David’s painful relationship with his beloved, despicable son Absalom and sets it in early 20th century England. Like the Old Testament story, Spring’s novel is a twisted tale seeped in sex, narcissism, and violence related in a matter-of-fact tone. The title makes Oliver’s fate clear. The awful fascination of the novel is watching how others react to the golden-haired schemer.
Archive for June, 2008
Awful Fascination in Sad, Wise Novel
Posted in 1938 Bestselling Novels, Psychological novel, tagged Absalom, Biblical tale, Irish freedom fighters, King David, Old Testament on June 25, 2008 | Comments Off
Time at the Top
Posted in 1938 Bestselling Novels, Lists of bestsellers by year on June 18, 2008 | Comments Off
Prior to 1950, it wasn’t uncommon for an author to have a book on the bestseller list for several years at a time. Of the ten 1938 bestselling novels, there are three that also were on the 1937 list: The Citadel by A. J. Cronin, The Rains Came by Louis Bromfield, and Northwest Passage by Kenneth Roberts.
Family Values Triumph in The Yearling
Posted in 1938 Bestselling Novels, Juvenile/Youth, My Top Pics, tagged coming-of-age novel, fawn, Florida on June 12, 2008 | Comments Off
Marjorie Kinnan Rawling’s poignant novel The Yearling hails from an era when a novel about growing up didn’t have to be about sex. Its realism, craftsmanship, and age-old truths will keep it alive when most contemporary coming-of-age novels are forgotten.
Classic Children’s Tale Tops 1938 Bestseller List
Posted in 1938 Bestselling Novels, Lists of bestsellers by year on June 4, 2008 | Comments Off
The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings topped the list of bestselling novels for 1938. The poignant tale was made into a film that keeps pretty much to the story, but loses a bit of the wistfulness of the book.
Other novels on the 1938 list are
#2 The Citadel by A.J. Cronin (#3 on the 1937 bestseller [...]
Bottom of 1948 list is top read today
Posted in 1948 Bestselling Novels, My Top Pics on June 3, 2008 | Comments Off
The Young Lions, Irwin Shaw’s whopping novel about three very different World War II soldiers, was #10 on the 1948 bestseller list. However, it is clearly the best of that year’s novels by today’s standards. By comparison, the best of the rest are mediocre.
Shaw shows how people of different temperaments reach differently to war. [...]
