everyman

Over the weekend I read Philip Roth's Everyman. It's a quick read. It took me about two hours. That was the only easy thing about this book.

Roth's brilliance is clearly on display here. It would be almost impossible to read the book and not identify with at least one of the characters. The identification with characters and story lines made this book intensely powerful. It affected my waking thoughts and my dreams.

The book is set around the US Jersey Shore and New York City, where I grew up. This added personal reality of the setting heightened the intensity for me. A key outcome of the book was to bring me back in my life. I found my thoughts and dreams wandering to my childhood, high school years and people and moments I hadn't thought of in a very long time.

Definitely a great summertime deck or beach book. A couple of glasses of wine afterward and you'll win for the best stories of the evening.