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F. Scott Fitzgerald – The Crack-Up with Other Pieces and Stories | Review

Title: The Crack-Up with Other Pieces and Stories

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald

Type: Fiction/Non-Fiction

Page Count: 160

Rating: 3.75/5

This one’s super cool because, as you can pretty much tell from the title, this little collection really has a bit of everything in it. It starts off with some essays and additional context and then from there it builds up with a couple of short stories.

One of those stories was Babylon Revisited, which I happen to have already read because it was the title story in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Penguin Mini Modern Classics edition, and so I didn’t bother with a re-read even though it was pretty good.

As for the rest of it, it was marvellous, although I did particularly like the non-fiction stuff that it kicked off with. It’s probably not the best Fitzgerald book to start with (The Great Gatsby, anyone?), but still worth picking up.

Learn more about The Crack-Up with Other Pieces and Stories.

John Green – Turtles All the Way Down | Review

Title: Turtles All the Way Down

Author: John Green

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 288

Rating: 4*/5

John Green – Turtles All the Way Down

To a certain extent, I already knew what I was getting into here. John Green’s writing feels a little more mature to me now, and that’s a good thing, but if you’ve read one of his books before then you’ll instantly slide back into his writing style. The characters are much the same as his characters usually are, too.

But we do get the anxiety and OCD representation from Aza which I found relatable, for the most part, although a lot of the things that she did annoyed me. But then that happens with most of his characters. I’m a little too old to fit the target market, but I do still think he’s a pretty good writer. He did a great job here of showing what it’s like to have intrusive thoughts, but I would have liked to have seen a little more of the murder mystery. Just like pretty much everyone else I’ve talked to.

On the whole, the dialogue and the narrative itself are pretty well handled here, and there are some great one-liners and intriguing ideas about life, the universe and everything. On the other hand, at one point he wrote “she said, askingly” and it made me want to vomit. I’m not sold on that even being a word but if it is, it’s a bad one. He could have just said “she asked”.

All in all though, this was a pretty good read. Overhyped perhaps, but that was always going to be the case. It’s certainly not a bad book, and I was impressed. I enjoyed it.