Repug's book of the month club

[Repugnant Abomination]

That's right, I'm starting a book of the month club exclusively for nubblies! You're all so lucky.

The main reason I want to do this is to keep myself on pace to read a novel a month. I was pretty good about it over the summer, slacked off a bit in early fall, and now I'm back on track. I just read Gulliver's travels, Moll Flanders, and most recently No country for old men (supposedly the movie kicks ass).

The book of December is East of Eden, but John Steinbeck.


Often described as Steinbeck's most ambitious novel, East of Eden brings to life the intricate details of two families, the Trasks and the Hamiltons, and their interwoven stories. The story is primarily set in the Salinas Valley, California, between the beginning of the 20th century and the end of the Great War (World War I), though some chapters are in Connecticut and Massachusetts, and the story goes as far back as the American Civil War.

The book explores themes of depravity, beneficence, love, and the struggle for acceptance, greatness, and the capacity for self-destruction and especially of guilt and freedom. It ties these themes together with references to and many parallels with the biblical Book of Genesis (especially Genesis Chapter 4, the story of Cain and Abel). It is sometimes called a religious book without a God.

According to his last wife Elaine, he considered this to be a requiem for himself—his greatest novel ever. Steinbeck stated about East of Eden: "It has everything in it I have been able to learn about my craft or profession in all these years." He further claimed: "I think everything else I have written has been, in a sense, practice for this."

The book is 601 pages, so it's a pretty ambitious task to finish it in a month, but with winter break here I think it's doable. I've read to page 50, and so far the book is very good. Steinbeck writes beautifully. I'll post a review once I finish.