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Title: The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer ISBN: 0-375-70081-1 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 28 April, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.13 (54 reviews)
Rating: 2
Summary: Much Ado About Nothing
Comment: Executioner's Song is the story of Gary Gilmore; the first convicted murderer to be executed after the death penalty was restored in the United States. Gilmore, a career criminal who had spent one half of his life incarcerated, had been sentenced to death for robbing and killing two people. He did not want to spend any more time behind bars so he insisted that the State of Utah carry out his sentence.
Norman Mailer makes a verbose attempt to turn Gilmore's story into an epic. Not having much to work with, he exaggerates the story to the point that some claims seem unreal. An example would be Gilmore's mother having had a strong feeling when he was three years old that his life would someday end by execution. Other trivial details include allusions to the Gilmore family being related to Houdini, the great escape artist.
While trying to turn Gilmore's relationship with his lover Nicole, who is a lost and aimless soul with a taste for drugs, into a modern Romeo And Juliet, Mailer is uncharacteristically brief when describing his victims. The story of Gary Mark Gilmore could have been the subject of a fine true crime book. However, Norman Mailer's extra long version turned it into a melodramatic account that does justice to no one.
Rating: 5
Summary: It's About A Lot More Than An Execution
Comment: This book is about nothing less than Human Nature and America. There is so much in this book to treasure that I would have to agree with other reviewers that it could have gone on twice as long.
Mailer's incredible book does two things. First it uses an epochal event to paint a portrait of America at a certain point of time. Most notably, to me at least, it captures (1)the hypocrisy of America's growing focus on Law & Order at a time when it reinstituted capital punishment and (2) the capitalist greed that epitomized the fierce contest for Gilmore's life story.
Second, and perhaps more importantly, Mailer capitalizes on fascinating factual occurrences to tell stories that no novelist could dream up. Gilmore is a character that seems so intelligent, carefree and fun to be around that you just want to throw your arms around him...until he resorts to brutal, random and inexplicable acts of violence. The affection keeps coming back until you once again remember his visious acts. No author could have dreamed up a character that stirs so much ambivalence in the reader. As for Gary and Nicole's romance, who could have dreamed up the twists and turns -- the suicide pacts, Nicole's institutionalization, the difficulty of the relationship in person contrasted with its ease when the two are separated. Finally, no author could create such a complete look inside the criminal mind without having complete access to an actual criminal.
Sorry if I was long-winded. This book is a true treasure.
Rating: 1
Summary: I Could Finish It But I Won't
Comment: Arrogant windbag, Norman Mailer, is at his most self-indulgent in this one. This thing needed an editor, and why can't Mailer just tell a story without resorting to excess detail and egotistical meanderings? Geez Mailer, you're not as great as you think you are so just tell the story and stop pretending like you're some kind of literary god, cause you're not, no matter how many awards you've won. Why don't you go and stab your wife again. Maybe that will do something for your writing. Because as it stands you got nothin.
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Title: In Cold Blood by Truman Capote ISBN: 0679745580 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 01 February, 1994 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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Title: Shot in the Heart by Mikal Gilmore ISBN: 0385478003 Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 01 August, 1995 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: The Naked and the Dead : 50th Anniversary Edition by Norman Mailer ISBN: 0312265050 Publisher: Picador USA Pub. Date: 05 August, 2000 List Price(USD): $16.00 |
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Title: The Armies of the Night: History As a Novel/the Novel As History by Norman Mailer ISBN: 0452272793 Publisher: Plume Pub. Date: January, 1995 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Ironweed by William J. Kennedy ISBN: 0140070206 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: August, 1989 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
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