To blog or not. The end all and be all of modern literary appreciation may be the ability of ordinary readers to write about their opinions in unfettered fashion. With or without pizzazz. Pith. Zip. This will be an experiment in expression for an ordinary sheila.
Currently, I’m reading Tree of Smoke, the 2007 National Book Award winner by Denis Johnson. It’s a monster volume at 614 pages and, at only 1/3 of the way, Tree of Smoke is rewarding on many levels. There are references to Graham Greene’s Quiet American, a priest trodding a path similar to that of that in Greene’s The Power and The Glory, a quietly burning love story, some intelligence skulduggery at the first wispings of the Vietnam conflict, and the never ending undercurrent of the madness of war.
