Book Review Brief: To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway

I finished my first Ernest Hemingway novel last night and frankly I wasn't so impressed, though I'm not ready to blame that on Hemingway.  For one thing, I kind of got lost about half way through it and never recovered.  A couple of chapters introduce new characters and, if I'm not mistaken, are narrated through their eyes.  All of that led to some confusion and confusion is difficult to fight when you're laying in bed, holding the book, and ready to fall asleep.

Also, this novel was written in the mid-1930s.  Hemingway didn't really become popular and an award-winner until the 50s.  So you could say that this book was perhaps not his greatest work.  Anyway, glad I completed it and back to the library it goes.

I'm currently entrenched in The Stories of John Cheever which is a collection of short stories.  Some have been very poignant.  At Barnes and Noble today (btw, I HATE paying full price--Amazon is usually the way to go--but we were on vacation) I picked up Graham Greene's The Heart of the Matter.  I plan to get to that sometime before the summer's out.