Of Mice and Men

by

mass market paperback, 118 pages

English language

Published Nov. 27, 1972 by Bantam Pathfinder Editions.

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5 stars (3 reviews)

Travelling across America in search of who you are—now they do it on cycles, in cars, by bus or in the time-honored tradition of foot and thumb. The wanderers of today may wear their hair long and speak a different jargon, but their trip is one that men (and women) have taken for as long as this country has been pushing at its frontiers.

John Steinbeck writes of such a trip in OF MICE AND MEN: the desperate longing of men for some kind of home—roots that they can believe in, land that they can care for—and the painful search for self. This beautiful, timeless novel speaks of the love that men can feel for each other—one inarticulate, dumb, sometimes violent in his need; the other clever, hopeful, and tied to a responsibility he thinks he doesn't want. --back cover

63 editions

reviewed Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Classics should be this short always

4 stars

I picked this up because I'm on a mission to read more of the books other people think you should have read. I hope it improved me in some way, because, spoiler alert, it has a sad end. And you can see it coming for the whole time. And I don't know what the answer is for Lennie and George, but they didn't deserve this.

It's good. It's tense, and anxious, and you're waiting for the other shoe to drop all the way through, and then when it does, you're simultaneously shocked and horrified, but also, not remotely surprised.

It's short, though, so there's that. And next time someone sends me a list of 99 books I should have read by now, I can tick this one off.

reviewed Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck

Great

5 stars

The famous Mark Twain quote "I didn't have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one" is now considered to be a misattribution, that Twain never said.

Nonetheless, whoever did say it - this book made me think of it. Truly it takes skill, craft, and artistry to write well and also be succinct.

This book feels perfect not because there's nothing else to add, but because there's nothing else to take away.

This book captured my imagination in 120 pages. And now it will stay with me for a while.