[guessing at the star rating / mining my old FB notes now that they are almost impossible to find]

i've got mixed feeling about this one. first of all, i saw the movie awhile back and it left me thinking for days. there seemed to be so much said within the silences (i think kate winslet has a gift for that - the silences in 'little children' also provoked me for days) so when i saw there was a book, of course i wanted to read it. there's a handicap in seeing a movie first: of course i 'saw' leonardo dicaprio and winslet in the roles when usually my mind would independently construct fresh characters. and since i felt the movie was primarily about them, i was annoyed (too strong a word?), ok more like bored with reading the backstories of other characters.

the book started strong: i was impressed with small details - like having frank sitting in the audience in his damp underwear. so real. and the content - the rejection of mainstream values and culture and this internal rebellion of wanting 'the american dream', it seemed so current. i was surprised to see the book was published in '71, which meant the book was set in the late-ish sixties at the most. so i'm guessing that middle class folk - already weighed down by commitments and therefore not participants of the counter culture movements - still felt the reverberations of that era. it's like their minds were infected by the virus, but their bodies kept living the pattern that was set before them.

anyhow, the ending was weak. suddenly all the minor characters build a crecendo to the final act (april's act, in fact) when these characters were simply distractions. what i wanted to read was frank's reaction, frank's viewpoint. all the other people with their chimed in thoughts reminded me of another late sixties book, 'Boys and Girls Together' and felt like a device that may have been popular at that time - the ending as a joint commentary.

i'll be watching the film again soon to see if my reading of the book changes my (excellent) opinion of the movie.