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Summary: Wolfeman needs an R&R
Review: Is a romance novelist writing under the name of Tom Wolfe? With all the rippling muscles and corded tendons, I thought I was reading Love, Lust & Lost in Atlanta..... Dump it at the next fund raiser at your local library...
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Summary: Big build-up lands flat
Review: After the interminable character developments, Wolfe left me feeling cheated by such a flaccid ending. Time to trade this in for some paperbacks.
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Summary: This is required reading for those living in Atlanta
Review: Tom Wolfe has captured the spirit of Atlanta and the South with gritty characters, and a speedily moving story.
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Summary: Great Book - Ended too soon
Review: Since most readers have written long reviews, I'll keep mine short and I will not mention food. I live in the South, 85 miles from Atlanta, and have worked in Atlanta for 5 years. I know most of these people, and the ones I don't know I am sure I have run into on Peachtree Street at some point. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and wished that it could continue. Like another reader, if the last 300 pages are ever written, I'd like to read those too.
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Summary: Great Until The End
Review: Like just about everyone else who reviewed this book, I found the ending to be one gigantic letdown. It really does feel like Wolfe got bored and just decided to slap a finale on so he could catch a 10:00 movie or something. It's exactly how I (and many others) felt at the end of "Bonfire," too. You'd think his editors would have pushed him on that. The first 650-odd pages are wonderful though, I stayed up way too late reading them. The details and descriptions are amusing and fascinating, and his little sobriquets (e.g. "Boys With Breasts" for the fashionable 90s female body type) are hilarious. A few other quibbles: (1) Wolfe may be fascinated with architectural details, but his characters all seem to know far more about it than they should. (2) Serena, the trophy wife, is never developed as a character-- we never find out anything about her background and what let her to be the type of woman who'd willingly sleep with (and marry) a man old enough to be her grandfather. And she's a major enough character to make this an oversight rather than an omission. (3) Wolfe hates the middle class-- the DA character in "Bonfire" and Peepgass in this novel get his greatest scorn, and in both cases it seems a bit undeserved. (Although Peepgass is seemingly redeemed at the very end.) Overall, well worth reading, but be prepared for a big letdown at the end.
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Summary: Only a few pages of classic Wolfe in an overdone volume
Review: Over 700 pages and only a few pages of the brillant Wolfe we waited to read. Who really wrote this book Tom? I want to believe it was someone other than yourself...A story without a central theme, a weak line and no focus. Too many characters who vanish and an ending that happens only out of necessity. Poor Epictetus crys from his grave for his defamation at your hands Mr. Wolfe.
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Summary: The Great Darwinian Novel
Review: Wolfe is best known as the leading American chronicler of each the last three decades, but in this novel he moves deeper into the more timeless terrain of human nature. His famous 1996 Forbes ASAP essay on Edward O. Wilson demonstrated that he has been grounding himself in the latest Neo-Darwinian thinking about how differences in sex, race, and sexual orientation impact society. Like the evolutionary psychologists (e.g., Steve Pinker), he's obsessed with how reproduction leads to the sex differences that make up the bedrock of human nature. Like the students of human biodiversity (e.g., me), Wolfe's fascinated by how race differences resemble faint sex differences: for example, few serious novels have been more concerned with its characters muscle to fat ratios. This may seem superficial but it's not, since muscle and fat percentages correlate with male and female hormones, which in turn correlate with personality and behavior (e.g., aggressiveness).Wolfe has been noticing racial differences in muscularity at least since Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers almost 30 years ago (recall Wolfe's description of how white bureaucrats fear hard-muscled black protestors, are less afraid of Mexicans, are not afraid of Chinese, and are dumb-founded by the massive Samoans), so it's not as if his recent readings in neo-Darwinism have radically altered his world-view -- instead they've merely brought organizing principles to his decades of obversations of humanity.
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Summary: Serious, Big Novel with a Capital "N"
Review: Tom Wolfe has again taken a sumptuous slice of American life (this time with a down-home barbecue tang) and laid out a first-rate picnic, sparing no sharply realized detail. He's holding up his "mirror to nature" in brilliant sunlight, tilted so it can burn us all good. He's America's social commentator and its sharpest critic, much like the big writers of this and any previous century. He's Alexander Pope without the stiff back, G.B. Shaw without the rumpled wardrobe and beard, Dickens without the sometimes awkward sentiment, Thackeray with an actual audience. "A Man In Full" reveals a complex, expertly woven narrative that fits together like a perfect dovetail joint -- drawing its strength from its undeniable craftsmanship.
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Summary: Some missed editing opportunities!
Review: I have fond memories of Wolfe's earlier works and I have the impression here that he was going for volume over value. There were some parts that could have been better edited and others that should have had longer treatment. Toward the end, when he attempts the resolution between Conrad and Charlie, he could have spent more time on their relationship and the reason why Stoicism is so attractive to Charlie. I had the feeling he was hurrying things along. Anyway, still an enjoyable, if long, read!!
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Summary: Couldn't put it down.
Review: At nearly 70 years of age, Tom Wolfe has once again unleashed his wild red dog. This ageless writer has chutzpah to spare, and the right stuff to back it up. A sweeping yet painfully and hilariously observant romp through what's left of America at the end of the most screwed-up and violent century -- is what "A Man in Full" is. I cannot recall the last time I couldn't wait to get home to read a book; what a delight it is to enjoy literature this much. The book may be imperfect, but what work of man isn't? You root for "A Man in Full" and you root for its creator; both deserve our undivided attention.
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