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April 16, 2025
On page 50 there is a typo, minor. I only mention it because it stands out: books published in the 1960s have fewer typographical errors than today. The editors and proofreaders were better.
It took several tries to get into this book; I have re-read the opening sixty pages many times. Now I am plunging ahead, because it is funny. The blurb on front cover is apt: “A novel about the inevitability of sex and taxes.”
The key plot point comes in at page 90; the title is explained on page 108. Fred Duncan, a commercial artist, fields corporate contracts, hires a local to fix his mansion’s plumbing, ponders mentoring a young hoodlum, and lets an old friend of his, now a United States senator, to conduct an affair with a married woman in one his upstairs bedrooms — all the while keeping a journal for tax purposes.
The journal is this novel. That’s the conceit.
It is a great deal of fun. My many failed attempts to “get into” the novel are no fault of the novel itself. This is well-written and droll.
It took several tries to get into this book; I have re-read the opening sixty pages many times. Now I am plunging ahead, because it is funny. The blurb on front cover is apt: “A novel about the inevitability of sex and taxes.”
The key plot point comes in at page 90; the title is explained on page 108. Fred Duncan, a commercial artist, fields corporate contracts, hires a local to fix his mansion’s plumbing, ponders mentoring a young hoodlum, and lets an old friend of his, now a United States senator, to conduct an affair with a married woman in one his upstairs bedrooms — all the while keeping a journal for tax purposes.
The journal is this novel. That’s the conceit.
It is a great deal of fun. My many failed attempts to “get into” the novel are no fault of the novel itself. This is well-written and droll.
Displaying 1 of 1 review