Reading about the death of the famed Stan Lee (nee Stanley Martin Lieber) I was inspired to re-read Kavalier & Clay, a novel about the comic book world in New York City in the 20th century. I think it's one of the best American novels I've read in 20 years and I've thought of re-reading before now.
Bret Easton Ellis agrees with me. He lists this book, along with Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections and Jonathan Lethem's The Fortress of Solitude as the three great books of his generation.
The Corrections was the book about which Franzen famously declared he was embarrassed to find Oprah Winfrey had chosen it for her book club. Well, said Oprah, I withdraw the book. Don't want anyone to be embarrassed to be one of my choices. He was for a time the laughingstock of American literary circles.
The book is actually rather good, and obviously. Not Franzen's best perhaps, nor his worst. I gave up on reading Franzen after his disappointing novel, Freedom.
I'm not sure why I'm allowing Ellis' choice of novels to influence me as I have read none of his work. Nor have I any interest in American Psycho, his most famous novel.
It may be time to re-read The Corrections. And I have The Fortress of Solitude on my Kindle. Why? Because if Ellis thinks these two books are in a superlative category with Kavalier & Clay then I ought to be reading them, eh?