THE GREAT GATSBY: U.K. fans if you pick up this months 'Esquire' (which has great features with Chris Pine and Leonard Nimoy...I promise this isn't a plug) it comes with a free classic novel...BARGAIN (again I stress, no plug). 'The Tenth Man' by Graham Greene and 'The Old Man & The Sea' by Ernest Hemingway are among the choices but I chose 'The Great Gatsby' by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I wanted to read this classic piece of American literature again before the movie version by Baz Lurhman, scored by Jay-Z (boy does it sound and look good) and starring Leo DiCaprio, Tobey Maguire and Carey Mulligan came out this Summer. On the surface some may think this short story looks like something about a bunch of people who should party less and stop cheating on each other, but this twenties jazz age tale is so much more. It's a a love versus money, 'prose' and cons study of the human condition by Fitzgerald which is better with every read and is wrote so beautifully. F. Scott is the master.
THE PERFECT STORM: £1, 1 day, read...and what a bargain. You're going to think I found a book goldmine. I'd say where I've been but then I need to stop with the plugs. Another book that became a movie, the very good, moving and underrated 'The Perfect Storm' starring George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg. The book is very different then the movie however, telling descriptive stories about both the crew and the fascinating factual nature of nature. For example did you know a single bolt of lightening in a hurricane has enough energy to power every home in the United States for four years...incredible. I mean people survive being struck. I must admit I had mixed feelings buying and reading a true book about the death of men at sea but just like the movie Sebastian Junger handels his subject matter with consideration and class. It's real, raw, taught and terrifying. A modern day 'Tempest'. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
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