It has been a long, long time since I had read this last. After seeing both of the recent movies I thought it might be good to revisit the novel and see how it lined up.
The first thing I thought when re-reading was that it has aged really well. It was hard to believe that this was written in the 1960s! There was a lot more action and intrigue than I remembered, too.
I liked reading about the characters that didn’t really make the cut of the movies. However I did feel like the pace of the writing was a little uneven, with some surprising fast-forward moments that caught me off guard.
In the book there is a lot more time spent inside Paul’s head, and although it gives more insight into his struggles it does seem a little ponderous at times. He doesn’t come off as a likable character to me – he shows little wonder or excitement with the dramatic changes surrounding him, and seems to care very little about the death of his son – not exactly father of the year material.
After a while I may get into the next book and see how it goes – I don’t remember how many of the books in the series I have read, but I’m willing to dig in a little deeper to see how it goes.
But in the meantime I’m reading Take What You Need by Idra Novey.
