Catch-22 ***

Just finished Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. As I told Alisa to other night, I'm not 100% sure I know how I feel about this book, so I just went with my current opinion. Catch-22. I didn't know anything about this book before I got it from the library. Right before I read it, my brother told me it was the inspiration behind M*A*S*H*, which intrigued me. That was about all I had going into it. After having finished it, I'm not 100% sure I could tell you now what it was about. If you've seen MASH, then you'll probably understand when I say it was hilarious and tragic almost at the same time. There were incredibly deep, poignant moments in this book. But, this book (as books go) was nowhere near as good as MASH (as far as TV shows go). Here is my biggest critique of the book. The great parts were tied together with stuff that seemed like it was in a dream. And not a particularly good one. A lot of it made little to no sense, the timelines kept jumping in a ridiculous manner, and there was no really coherent flow to the narrative. Now, it is likely that all of that was purposeful, and in some aspects of the book it worked fine, and in some it really detracted in my opinion. Overall, I thought the book was quite good. It could have been so much more. And again I think that MASH provides a great juxtaposition. In early episodes of MASH, the humor came first, and if some plot or character development happened, okay. In later MASH, it was still very funny, but there was more of a connection to the characters, and a feeling of reality. This book didn't feel real, so when the tragic things happened, it still had that dreamy quality to it, as if it wasn't reality, and so it wasn't as impactful. Some of it just felt like the Stooges were trying to portray Schindler's List. (obviously hyperbole). Again, I'd probably recommend it, but with some caveats. As some of the others, I don't understand its prominence in literary circles/best of lists. But it was a good book. The next book on the list is Ulysess by James Joyce. I might end up skipping it, and coming back to it, or taking a bit of a break. Just looking at that book gives me shingles.