by: Raymond ChandlerI started this on the hot sunny Jersey beach in June. Brought it with me on vacation, read it in the car traveling with my family. Read it poolside at the hotel in Colorado, at the breakfast table drinking coffee and listening to the early morning bluejays feeding on the birdfeeder (in Minnesota), in the park in Chicago and finished it back in my apartment in Jersey. I would not suggest picking it up and putting the book down as much as I did. There were a lot of pages that I had to re-read and prior chapters that I had to refresh my memory on.
The Long Goodbye is an interesting murder mystery book, written in 1930 detective style: "I sat there in a dark bar. The dame across the room caught my eye. She was sitting there. Alone and distraught over something. I ordered a martini--extra dry, two olives--for the lady and another gimlet for myself" This style was kind of fun to read in the beginning, because I would have to narrate the entire story in my head in that detective voice. As the murder mystery went on, I dropped the internal voice to concentrate on the story. But picking the book up so may times, I think some of the little details got lost in translation, my voice, or went on vacation.The cast of characters grew and the story became predictable. After the second death I had figured it out, but wanted to keep reading to see if I was right. Did others find this predictable? Is the 1973 movie the same as the book?
. He was interesting to read about because he never grew out of his five year old viewpoint of the world. His love for exploring nature and writing took him all over. After traveling all over the country trying unsuccessfully to find a journalism job he settled back in NY, where he started. What I just stated in a few sentences, Scott Elledge tells in over 200 pages (half the book!). Elledge loves to tell the story of E.B. White, but I think he could have written this book with atleast 100 pages less. I got bored of Elledge's rambling, so I put it down. 
. The first half was incredible. It was so interesting to read about John Nash's upbringing, his schooling and how he found his love in math. About 150 pages in, the book turned into math symbols, theories, Mathematicians, and that's when I stopped. Sorry John, I'm just not as smart as you.
for my book club. Timothy Egan's prologue jumped around a lot and gave un-relevant background information. I pressed on and the writing got better. I thought it would be about Teddy Roosevelt's presidency and his desire to save the National Forests-- as the title suggests-- it was; however, it was also about