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Cass Timberlane
This novel was written late in the career of Sinclair Lewis, it explores themes of love, marriage, heartache, trust & redemption in a small Minnesota town.
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1945
26 people are currently reading
385 people want to read
About the author
Sinclair Lewis
501 books1,114 followersNovelist Harry Sinclair Lewis satirized middle-class America in his 22 works, including
Babbitt
(1922) and
Elmer Gantry
(1927) and first received a Nobel Prize for literature in 1930.
Middle-class values and materialism attach unthinking George F. Babbitt, the narrow-minded, self-satisfied main character person in the novel of Sinclair Lewis.
People awarded "his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters."
He knowingly, insightfully, and critically viewed capitalism and materialism between the wars. People respect his strong characterizations of modern women.
Henry Louis Mencken wrote, "[If] there was ever a novelist among us with an authentic call to the trade...it is this red-haired tornado from the Minnesota wilds."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclai...
Middle-class values and materialism attach unthinking George F. Babbitt, the narrow-minded, self-satisfied main character person in the novel of Sinclair Lewis.
People awarded "his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of characters."
He knowingly, insightfully, and critically viewed capitalism and materialism between the wars. People respect his strong characterizations of modern women.
Henry Louis Mencken wrote, "[If] there was ever a novelist among us with an authentic call to the trade...it is this red-haired tornado from the Minnesota wilds."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclai...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews
February 6, 2017
This is one of Sinclair Lewis's lesser known works. Published in 1945, it was made into a movie in 1947 starring Spencer Tracy and Lana Turner. I found a first edition copy on my grandmothers bookshelf and decided to read it. It was quite good with themes of marriage, love, betrayal, and community. Excellent writing as you would expect from Lewis.
August 12, 2008
This book was written late in the career of Sinclair lewis.He had fun with it ,but it was not without serious undertones or piercing social commentary. That said much of it highlights how what from a distance seems like banal self absorption is in fact the workings of a heart or mind searching for meaning.The book has a lot of froth to it , but also shadow and in spots it is deeply poignant.I adore the places where the author gives us word craft that is perfectly nuanced and moves like poetry with its work boots on ..so muscled and nimble that you forget how functional the words are.Mr.Lewis takes on the institution of marriage in this book with that odd mix of idealism and rank cynicism that is the hallmark of so much of his social commentary.The book has a good deal of humor in it and a lot of entertainment value. Its a joy to read out loud with dialog that never stalls -except in the most ingenious way..so that words dangle in the air after they are spoken. The two main characters are Judge Cass Timberlane ,and his love and wife Jinny. She is as smart as he and quick to his deep. This book can be read casually and enjoyed or read carefully and slowly which then creates an experience that transcends mere entertainment and leaves one musing about the characters and their times and ours too......
February 23, 2009
This may be Sinclair Lewis's most forgiving book. It's a meditation on marriage, with Judge Cass Timberlane's passion for and pursuit of Jinny as its centerpiece. Along with their courtship and marriage, Lewis presents mini-portraits of other couples in the community: some delightful, others wildly dysfunctional and destructive.
I came across this novel during a recent big cleanout and decided to give it a go. It was most readable, most intriguing. I really enjoyed it.
I came across this novel during a recent big cleanout and decided to give it a go. It was most readable, most intriguing. I really enjoyed it.
January 22, 2020
"Cass Timberlane" is a novel written by Sinclair Lewis in 1945. Almost everyone that reads the book loves the book. Having said that I personally know noone who has read, will read or has ever even heard of the book. But from reviews I've read most people enjoy the book. Except me of course. If this had been the first Sinclair Lewis novel I read I probably would have stopped there. I just didn't like it. I have read hundreds of books and re-read dozens of them. I always finish a book, well almost always. There were two I gave up on, Cass Timberlane was nearly the third. I began the book with high hopes having enjoyed so many Sinclair Lewis books before, by page 20 I just wasn't enjoying the story but it often takes me awhile to get into a story so I kept going. At the halfway point I really expected to be interested in the characters and their lives, I wasn't. By page 300 I was just looking forward to it all ending.
Our main character is Cass Timberlane which you probably already figured out. He is a judge in the fictional city Grand Republic, Minnesota. Now you would think from reading the book that Cass is one of the oldest people in the town even though we are told on the first page that he was a young judge, age forty-one, in his first year on the bench. He meets the love of his life, Virginia "Jinny" Marshland when she testifies in his court, by page 5 he is in love with her. The narrator tells us however that:
"She was perhaps twenty-four to his forty-one, but he insisted that Jinny and he were young together....."
So Jinny is young and he is old. While it is true that Jinny is 24 years old and Cass is 41, the difference in their ages doesn't seem so shocking to me. After all, my husband and I have them beat by a year, our age gap being 18 years. Then there is also:
"Why should a charming girl, probably a dancer to phonographs, have any desire to cure the lonelinesses of forty-year-old single gentlemen? There was tenderness and loyalty in Jinny, he felt, but what would she want with a judge whom she would find out not to be a judge at all but another gaunt and early-middle-aged man who played the flute?"
How in the world does he know there is tenderness and loyalty in her when he hasn't even talked to her yet? And there is that age gap mentioned again. The plot of the book is certainly marriage, and the marriage of Cass and Jinny is the main focus. Cass is serious, he loves being a judge, he loves working and when he comes home he loves being in his study with his books. Sounds good to me. Jinny however, is easily bored, in about five minutes she is ready for something new. She does seem to be fond of Cass and she will try for awhile, five minutes or so, to fit into his life, but then boredom takes over and there she goes again. Jinny loves parties, and lunches, dinners out, dancing, acting, flirting with men, anything she thinks of as exciting, and Cass isn't exciting. Cass runs around, or I guess I should say walks around, he is an old judge after all, telling everyone that Jinny is a goddess and an angel, it would be annoying even if it were true. When Jinny finally leaves him for a more exciting man in a more exciting city no one could be surprised. Don't worry though there is more to the story or I wouldn't have told you what may have been the ending.
During all this, just sort of thrown in here and there are stories called "An Assemblage of Husbands and Wives" they are interspersed throughout the book, and they presents the bleakest collection of marriages I think I've ever read. In more than one story the people in it either commit or try to commit suicide, in one a husband seems to be in love with his daughter, one husband tricks his wife into having an affair so he can divorce her, everyone is miserable. Wives are called vicious, cow-like, shrill, stubborn and monotonous. One married story that did make me smile was of a man and a woman that had been married for fifty years:
"He loved porridge for breakfast, and every morning, three hundred and sixty-five mornings a year, they had porridge. It was after thirty-two years of it that Fanny reported, a bit reluctantly, "I think I'm beginning to like the nasty stuff."
In another marriage:
"Beecher usually went to sleep to her inane discussion of something that would have happened if it had only happened."
We also have one husband, a superintendent of schools:
"He was referred to in the press as 'one of our greatest builders', because during his reign there had been erected three red-brick school-buildings which looked like red-brick school-buildings."
And finally I did smile when I read this:
"Some of these smart-aleck critics claim that Middlewestern businessmen haven't changed much since that book--what's its name?-- by this Communist writer, Upton Sinclair--"Babbitt," is it?--not changed much since that bellyache appeared, some twenty years ago."
I wanted to like this book, I wanted to love this book, I expected to because after all it was by the author of "Babbitt"one of my favorites. When I got to that last page though I was just glad it was over. Read the book and let me know what you think of it. Am I glad I read it? Well, even reading a book I don't like is better than not reading a book at all, but I could have picked a better one.
Our main character is Cass Timberlane which you probably already figured out. He is a judge in the fictional city Grand Republic, Minnesota. Now you would think from reading the book that Cass is one of the oldest people in the town even though we are told on the first page that he was a young judge, age forty-one, in his first year on the bench. He meets the love of his life, Virginia "Jinny" Marshland when she testifies in his court, by page 5 he is in love with her. The narrator tells us however that:
"She was perhaps twenty-four to his forty-one, but he insisted that Jinny and he were young together....."
So Jinny is young and he is old. While it is true that Jinny is 24 years old and Cass is 41, the difference in their ages doesn't seem so shocking to me. After all, my husband and I have them beat by a year, our age gap being 18 years. Then there is also:
"Why should a charming girl, probably a dancer to phonographs, have any desire to cure the lonelinesses of forty-year-old single gentlemen? There was tenderness and loyalty in Jinny, he felt, but what would she want with a judge whom she would find out not to be a judge at all but another gaunt and early-middle-aged man who played the flute?"
How in the world does he know there is tenderness and loyalty in her when he hasn't even talked to her yet? And there is that age gap mentioned again. The plot of the book is certainly marriage, and the marriage of Cass and Jinny is the main focus. Cass is serious, he loves being a judge, he loves working and when he comes home he loves being in his study with his books. Sounds good to me. Jinny however, is easily bored, in about five minutes she is ready for something new. She does seem to be fond of Cass and she will try for awhile, five minutes or so, to fit into his life, but then boredom takes over and there she goes again. Jinny loves parties, and lunches, dinners out, dancing, acting, flirting with men, anything she thinks of as exciting, and Cass isn't exciting. Cass runs around, or I guess I should say walks around, he is an old judge after all, telling everyone that Jinny is a goddess and an angel, it would be annoying even if it were true. When Jinny finally leaves him for a more exciting man in a more exciting city no one could be surprised. Don't worry though there is more to the story or I wouldn't have told you what may have been the ending.
During all this, just sort of thrown in here and there are stories called "An Assemblage of Husbands and Wives" they are interspersed throughout the book, and they presents the bleakest collection of marriages I think I've ever read. In more than one story the people in it either commit or try to commit suicide, in one a husband seems to be in love with his daughter, one husband tricks his wife into having an affair so he can divorce her, everyone is miserable. Wives are called vicious, cow-like, shrill, stubborn and monotonous. One married story that did make me smile was of a man and a woman that had been married for fifty years:
"He loved porridge for breakfast, and every morning, three hundred and sixty-five mornings a year, they had porridge. It was after thirty-two years of it that Fanny reported, a bit reluctantly, "I think I'm beginning to like the nasty stuff."
In another marriage:
"Beecher usually went to sleep to her inane discussion of something that would have happened if it had only happened."
We also have one husband, a superintendent of schools:
"He was referred to in the press as 'one of our greatest builders', because during his reign there had been erected three red-brick school-buildings which looked like red-brick school-buildings."
And finally I did smile when I read this:
"Some of these smart-aleck critics claim that Middlewestern businessmen haven't changed much since that book--what's its name?-- by this Communist writer, Upton Sinclair--"Babbitt," is it?--not changed much since that bellyache appeared, some twenty years ago."
I wanted to like this book, I wanted to love this book, I expected to because after all it was by the author of "Babbitt"one of my favorites. When I got to that last page though I was just glad it was over. Read the book and let me know what you think of it. Am I glad I read it? Well, even reading a book I don't like is better than not reading a book at all, but I could have picked a better one.
December 15, 2011
Center to most of Lewis' writing is the institution of marriage. Unlike the concept of marriage that may have been enforced upon us through our younger years, Lewis is unafraid to discuss the complexities of life with one another. These complexities are not simply displayed through the various interactions between the lead character, Cass, and female counterparts, but also through vignettes of Midwestern marriages. Unlike his earlier novels, this work ends on more of a hopeful note; perhaps this is a result of gained wisdom or longing for art to reflect life (or was it the other way around...).
May 8, 2013
Sinclair Lewis is to fiction writing what Cole Porter is to popular music: smart, adept and witty. Fortunately, both men rarely seemed to take their work so seriously that it threatened to take the fun out of their projects (I'm talking to you, James Joyce). He created a character who I suspect lots of ordinary yet above-average, strong yet vulnerable, in-control yet sensitive men will relate to, though never admit. That is, many of us can relate to the story until the Hollywood ending that contradicts the point of the story. It's almost as if Mr. Lewis envisioned his book being made into a movie starring Spencer Tracy and Lana Turner. Doesn't get more Hollywood than that.
May 16, 2015
Since I've already seen the movie (a LONG time ago), I pictured Spencer Tracy as Cass Timberlane, and Lana Turner as Jinny Marshland, even though neither one of them matched the descriptions in the book! The story was fast-paced, well-written and often amusing, as well as tragic. The interspersed descriptions of the myriad marriages, good and bad, in Grand Republic added to this interesting look at love and marriage in the 1940's. And I loved Cleo the cat!
December 14, 2015
I read this many years ago, high school I think, because it was not on my written list of books I've kept since high school. I ran across it again so wanted to add it to my list. I think I did like it somewhat, but it was so long ago that I can't remember too much. I read it because I had seen the old movie made from it starring Spencer Tracy, who is one of my favorite actors.
July 21, 2024
I only read the first half, I got bored.
October 31, 2019
I found this book at a used bookstore and was amazed that there was a Sinclair Lewis book I had not read! It was $26 which was a little shocking, turns out an out of print book can fetch a premium price. Was too high a price, but I couldn't wait to tell my Dad about it, given we share Lewis as a favorite author. He hadn't read it either. Then Dad died a couple of months later. I went back and bought it. Wish I could pass it on to him to read, or at least talk to him about it. It's thoughts like these that make me miss him so much.
The book was good. Dated in terms of marital norms, maybe that's why it's out of print. But Lewis has these characters that you admire so much you just wish people were really like that.
The book was good. Dated in terms of marital norms, maybe that's why it's out of print. But Lewis has these characters that you admire so much you just wish people were really like that.
Want to read
May 16, 2012THIS IS A WARTIME BOOK is printed on the copyright page and followed with The text is complete and unabridged but every effort has been made to comply with the Government's request to conserve essential materials - so, yes, a book that has survived several space remodels and inventory deaccesions but looks like it hasn't been scanned out, checked out since around the time you could tune your dial to I Love Lucy.
Odd, this relative neglect, for this "Novel of Husbands and Wives" grabs you, pulls you, invites you right on in - a courtroom scene, with the Honorable Cass Timberlane, a bored young (41, young for a judge) bachelor (divorced) drowsing dreamily through tedious testimony concerning an icy slice of injurious pavement until, well, she takes the stand. She? She is Jinny. Virginia "Jinny" Marshland. Then he's all there. Then he's all ears.
Cass walks home through the streets of the fictional Grand Republic, Minnesota - remember: it was the age of walking home from work, i.e. saving the essential materials for the Effort - and (for the moment) writes off this lovely genie, this sudden Jinny, as "probably a dancer to phonograph records."
And then there is this great, great scene with a stray cat, a "little black clown", that crosses his path and, well, he takes her home. Cat stalks Cass' castle and talks in "jaunty cat-slang." And the maid exhults, "Will you look at that Cleo! She knows where the refrigerator is, already!"
Still, poor cat does that thing poor cats do, where she enters a room and...well, the cat gets cold, the feline freezes. Just a horrified ball of fur. The judge offers a stroke of comfort, a caress of its cowl, and states, probably not for the first time ever (you get a sense this bit of Poe-woe is a rehearsed line) but, at least, for the first time to one of creation's creatures, "Too many ghosts in this house, Cleo. You must drive them out...I have lived too long among shadows."
And that gets y'all to page 17.
/pg. 55 - May 2012/ maybe later. more an autumn read.
Odd, this relative neglect, for this "Novel of Husbands and Wives" grabs you, pulls you, invites you right on in - a courtroom scene, with the Honorable Cass Timberlane, a bored young (41, young for a judge) bachelor (divorced) drowsing dreamily through tedious testimony concerning an icy slice of injurious pavement until, well, she takes the stand. She? She is Jinny. Virginia "Jinny" Marshland. Then he's all there. Then he's all ears.
Cass walks home through the streets of the fictional Grand Republic, Minnesota - remember: it was the age of walking home from work, i.e. saving the essential materials for the Effort - and (for the moment) writes off this lovely genie, this sudden Jinny, as "probably a dancer to phonograph records."
And then there is this great, great scene with a stray cat, a "little black clown", that crosses his path and, well, he takes her home. Cat stalks Cass' castle and talks in "jaunty cat-slang." And the maid exhults, "Will you look at that Cleo! She knows where the refrigerator is, already!"
Still, poor cat does that thing poor cats do, where she enters a room and...well, the cat gets cold, the feline freezes. Just a horrified ball of fur. The judge offers a stroke of comfort, a caress of its cowl, and states, probably not for the first time ever (you get a sense this bit of Poe-woe is a rehearsed line) but, at least, for the first time to one of creation's creatures, "Too many ghosts in this house, Cleo. You must drive them out...I have lived too long among shadows."
And that gets y'all to page 17.
/pg. 55 - May 2012/ maybe later. more an autumn read.
February 13, 2013
Saw the end of a movie with the same title with Spencer Tracey and Lana Turner and decided to get the used book. (Betterworldbooks.com). That's how I discovered Dodsworth, which is one of my favorites. Going very slowly through the book because I have a lot going on now but I really like it. Sinclair Lewis is one of a kind -- what a writer! I love how every generation thinks they are the only ones who have problems in relationships but Mr. Lewis nails it with his descriptions of the right honorable Judge (and former Congressman) acting like a silly school boy over the lovely and much younger Jinny.
Well, I'm halfway through and I think I've had enough. Just can't take the bizarre and twisted marriages of some of the characters. I'll still cherish Dodsworth, but I have other things to read now.
Well, I'm halfway through and I think I've had enough. Just can't take the bizarre and twisted marriages of some of the characters. I'll still cherish Dodsworth, but I have other things to read now.
December 25, 2012
Lewis demonstrates the adage that the more things change, the more they stay the same. While some of the events date the story to the World War II era, the issues of love, equality, and greed are as fresh as if just penned. Jinny's near-catastrophic love affair and east coast romp identify Lewis as a realist, the resurrected marriage makes him a romanticist, and his satire of American excess reminds me of the mildly Socialistic viewpoint of Babbit. The importance he gives to place predates the emphasis Wendell Berry has given to the same subject, a critique of the imperialist ideal of explore and conquer, which was clearly a part of the global consciousness at the time.
May 24, 2015
A sometimes gentle, sometimes skewering look at the personal lives of the inhabitants of a smallish Minnesota town in the 1940s. The book centers around Cass Timberlane, the local Judge, and his friends and colleagues.
The book does a great job capturing shifting friendships and petty slights as well as crushing emotional letdowns. At the heart of the book is Cass Timberlane's relationship with Jinny Marshland, who is much younger, more spontaneous, and more mercurial than the level-headed and rational judge. You'll have to read the book to find out whether things work out or not!
The book does a great job capturing shifting friendships and petty slights as well as crushing emotional letdowns. At the heart of the book is Cass Timberlane's relationship with Jinny Marshland, who is much younger, more spontaneous, and more mercurial than the level-headed and rational judge. You'll have to read the book to find out whether things work out or not!
May 2, 2020
A good but not terrific read. This is about the marriage of Judge Cass Timberlane and a much younger woman, Jinny. It's a strange relationship at best. I've always felt that many of Lewis books have an unreal quality to them, that people have reactions that are not what you would usually expect in the situations Lewis puts them in. That's especially the case in this book. However, that being said I still enjoy reading him.
July 13, 2011
An almost certainly more progressive novel at the time than it appears in retrospect. Lewis really didn't have a very good opinion of marriage, did he?
From a modern point of view, the heroine is irritatingly vapid and the hero is a jerk. For goodness' sakes people, get a life.
From a modern point of view, the heroine is irritatingly vapid and the hero is a jerk. For goodness' sakes people, get a life.
October 8, 2013
This was not on the current ABA list of books, but some thought it should be. A good novel, but nothing to do with the law except that Cass is a state district court judge and is attracted to a witness.
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May 1, 2009Fiction
Read
May 27, 2012The first Lewis I read. He was the only writer to me who mattered for a while.
November 3, 2012
Sinclair Lewis has to make a satire out of every human being. The book would be better if you knew he did not secretly scoff at his characters.
January 15, 2013
Sometimes surprisingly insightful, other times just sort of a romance.
September 13, 2016
Without Sinclair Lewis, there would be no Jonathan Franzen. Not one of Lewis's better books, but nobody does snarky social criticism better.
September 3, 2015
One of the best books I ever read. Relationship issues have not changed. Think of a relationship. It is covered in this book. The characters are real.
July 18, 2012
Currently reading now!
December 24, 2020
I utterly adored this book. Objectively and in daily life, I might give it four stars, as it takes some dedication to finish; however, I randomly picked this book up in a used bookstore, knowing nothing about it. I told myself for a year I would get around to opening it up and finally on my honeymoon, opened the first page to a book on "husbands and wives" with a dog named Alfred! I am newly married with my own little Alfred, what were the chances?! I did not have the experience others did in reviewing this book, I was thoroughly amused with Jinny Marshland's wayward spirit, zest for life, and dichotomous moods, seeing the sanctification marriage unfolds in her..Eventually. I respected Cass's devotion and ability to only be himself and none else than the upward citizen to arrive at 7:58 1/2 to an 8:00 start-time. What I loved most was the banter back and forth between Cass and Jinny, and I utterly fell in love with Cleo the cat! A book at reads like an old movie. Turns out it became one! I couldn't think of a better actor to manifest Judge Timberlane's role than Spencer Tracy.
"To Cass..Aside from shop-talk, which includes the whispering of lovers, anything printed, a time-table or the rich prose of a tomato-catsup label, is more stimulating than any talk, even the screaming of six economists and an intellectual actress."
"To Cass..Aside from shop-talk, which includes the whispering of lovers, anything printed, a time-table or the rich prose of a tomato-catsup label, is more stimulating than any talk, even the screaming of six economists and an intellectual actress."
November 2, 2022
Lewis is my second venture into C20th American literature, the first being Steinbeck, and I greatly prefer him. His characterization is more realistic, and his sexual politics excellent. The book is, evidently, mostly about Timberlane, a good man and a competent judge, who loves his cat Cleo and his young wife Jinny very deeply. The book states his thoughts a great deal, so you could almost call it stream of consciousness from a certain perspective. But the subtitle of the book is "a novel about husbands and wives," and Lewis portrays the inner often harsh realities of families sympathetically without dwelling on them. The fade-away wife of the blustering town doctor is a chronic victim of marital rape, often suicidal, and one woman who is the victim of domestic violence has the courage to challenge her husband when he eyes his sixteen year old daughter incestuously. Timberlane's family life is held up to more public scrutiny than most. Anyway, I like Lewis, and look forward to reading many more of his books.
Lewis, I neglected to mention (because I just found out) was the first American to win the Nobel Prize in literature. He is also very, very funny.
Lewis, I neglected to mention (because I just found out) was the first American to win the Nobel Prize in literature. He is also very, very funny.
June 29, 2024
This is about the world where my parents grew up, and where Sinclair Lewis was a friend and neighbor for a while. I could not be objective. It is the first Sinclair Lewis novel I've read as an adult. I feel like I've just done some time travel and seen my ancestors out the window while the drama was inside the Timberlane house.
The style was so hard for me to follow at first that I almost returned it to the library, but then I became curious about the outcome. It turns out I knew what would happen, with a couple of details that I couldn't have imagined due to the time in which it was placed.
Fascinating in its timelessness, but also in its datedness. The whole socio-economic sense of that place and time seems bizarre and yet I have other evidence that it was really like that.
The style was so hard for me to follow at first that I almost returned it to the library, but then I became curious about the outcome. It turns out I knew what would happen, with a couple of details that I couldn't have imagined due to the time in which it was placed.
Fascinating in its timelessness, but also in its datedness. The whole socio-economic sense of that place and time seems bizarre and yet I have other evidence that it was really like that.
January 24, 2023
You can take Sinclair Lewis out of sociopolitical commentary, but you can't take sociopolitical commentary out of Sinclair Lewis. While this book lacks the overt themes of his great works, he can't help but slide in union lawyers, gentrification, consumerism, etc. Even a book ostensibly about marriage, and the 'war between the sexes' at a time of war abroad, often comes down to social issues. SL was prescient in identifying some of the greater freedoms ahead for women. At one point even Judge Timberlane suggests his wife get a job (but not, dear lord, one that keeps her away from home until eight o'clock!). All this plus a dizzying number of Midwestern townies, and their marriages.
October 18, 2025
It was a joy to pick up a late-period Sinclair Lewis novel and find it to be so entertaining. Some of the excursions into marriages only slightly related to the main story line tried my patience. But it's easy to see that Lewis had fun with them. As for the love story of Cass and Ginny, it is actually quite touching in parts, and the ending, in particular, is nicely handled. Having seen the movie a couple of times, I kept picturing Lana Turner as Ginny, which isn't all bad. Adding to my enjoyment is that I purchased this book at a used-book shop in Duluth, the city in which Lewis wrote most of it.
June 16, 2017
Reading this was like chewing on a tasty yet somewhat overcooked 1940s roast mutton. Loved the 40s lifestyle and lingo "And how!" but didn't really empathize with stolid priggish Judge Timberlane until the end, maybe because his young bride, Jinny, never came alive for me. I have a feeling Lewis wasn't too comfortable writing about women. Looking forward to exploring this theory in more of his novels.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 43 reviews