Essays of what?
Customer Rating: 
I originally chose to read this book because it was written by Joan Didion. I found it was a mistake quite soon. At least for me. When I decided to read the book, I thought that it was one long piece. It is not. It is a series of essays on topics ranging from keeping a notebook ("On Keeping a Notebook") to the loose marriages in Las Vegas (Marrying Absurd). Some are as short as a couple pages some are closer to twenty, but most are in between.
I accredit Joan Didion as a wonderful writer and I believe that she deserves the praise she receives, but I was rather disappointed when I picked up this book, especially because I expected so much of her and this book. But each time she started a new section she failed to get me interested enough to want to continue reading. The essays don't have the benefit of being connected by a common theme or subject.
I was taught to write with metaphorical gold coins left along the path for the reader to find. Each coin could be a fun fact or anecdote that makes the reader want to learn more and perhaps find another. I never found Didion's gold coins. It possible, even likely, that they were there, but simply not shiny enough for me.
Another way I judge a good piece of writing is that I will notice how often I have until the end of the chapter. In a really good book, I never have to check because I am so lost in the story that a mundane thing like going to bed at a reasonable time, or in fact anything outside of what the author is telling me, ceases to matter. In this particular work, I found myself checking once every half of a page.
While Didion is a genius and other of books may hold my attention better, this is not what I consider to be her best series of work.
Yeats, The Grateful Dead, and All That
Customer Rating: This book starts out citing W.B. Yeats and Peggy Lee, co-equals in esteem and regard. Yeats and his slouching towards Bethlehem, "Turning and turning in the widening gyre / The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the center cannot hold...And What rough best, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?" and this lovely gem from Miss Peggy, "I learned courage from Buddha, Jesus, Lincoln, Einstein, and Cary Grant." And what a unique dichotomy to start out a unique collection of essays uniquely told, from a voice risen above voices of that time--Joan Didion.
This book has a little story to it worth telling. I found myself in Boston of all places in the Harvard Book Store (no affiliation I guess to the better known little school near by). A bookstore staff member points out her recommendations from the staff recommendations section. It turns out she grew up in California parents of some freerer spirited, macrobiotic, driven by the very power of flowers types. This book store maven also goes to the little Harvard school and she recommends Joan Didion as one of her very fave reads of all fave reads. I having spent time in Cali myself and thinking that San Francisco is America's greatest city and having always been vexed, perplexed, and intrigued by that 60's counter-culture period in our country couldn't resist picking up the book...well picking it up from Amazon. Where else would one in their right mind buy books after all?
Joan Didion, as it turns out, is a phenomenal writer. She hails from Sacramento and wasn't in the thick of experiencing the 60's (aka Hunter Thompson) but a passionate 3rd person observer. She writes as if she is reporting on the age, place, and times but between the lines you pick up the pathos of these words, "Michael (a three-year old) burned his arm though, which is probably why Sue Ann was so jumpy when she happened to see him chewing on an electric cord. 'You'll fry like rice,' she screamed...they didn't notice Sue Ann screaming at Michael because they were in the kitchen trying to retrieve some very good Moroccan hash which had dropped down through a floorboard damaged in the fire." And things fell apart.
But "Slouching Towards Bethlehem," isn't about the Haight-Ashbury district scene alone. Didion's writing extends to a love letter for John Wayne, personal reflections (which are far from self-absorbent as personal reflections can trend), and a witty eye that takes it all in unflinchingly, bracingly, and honest. Here's a little nugget from "On Self Respect," "...it is difficult in the extreme to continue fancying oneself Cathy in Wuthering Heights with one's head in a Food Fair bag. There is a similar case for all the small disciplines, unimportant in themselves; imagine maintaining any kind of swoon, commiserative or carnal, in a cold shower."
I'll be a faithful reader of Didion for many moons to come. Thank you Harvard Book Store girl...thank you Amazon. Don't miss out on Didion dear readers. ...mmw
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