Book: The Neon Bible / John Kennedy Toole


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It’s a rare depressed 17-year-old that can express that angst in a subtle and compelling novel. John Kennedy Toole was not yet employing his outrageous sense of humor when he wrote this (he later wrote A Confederacy of Dunces), which makes this a bit of a dismal, Salinger-esque read. I’m confident that Holden Caulfield fans would appreciate it. I did, though it left me sad that Toole didn’t fare better in the literary (and existential) world.


3 responses to “Book: The Neon Bible / John Kennedy Toole”

  1. I’m presently reading The World Is Flat, by the NYTimes writer Thomas Friedman. It’s a really interesting look at outsourcing. I’m only just into it a hundred pages (it’s a big book) but it’s right up your alley, I think.

  2. I think my copy of A Confederacy of Dunces had a short bio on Toole in it, and this book had a much more in-depth background story. There’s a pretty good Wikipedia
    entry
    on him too.

    Thanks for the recommendation!

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