Ray

Rating:
Summary: Hannah's best novel
Review: Barry Hannah is the kind of writer people either love or hate; he doesn't leave a lot of middle ground. But "Ray" is a novel that should have wide appeal--it's clever, insightful, original, and quick. (Even those who won't like won't be able to say that it wasted a lot of their time.)

This was the second work of Hannah's that I ever read (the first was "Airships"), and it made me a fan for life.

Rating:
Summary: a joy
Review: Near the end of "Ray," Mr. Hooch is "beating [up] Shakespeare" with his poetry. Hannah doesn't beat up Shakespeare, but he musters up a fierce, admirable assault: "Sabers, gentlemen, sabers!" The novel isn't perfect -- it isn't Shakespeare -- but the writing is so alive, so strong, that it feels right filthy to root in the muck for a word of criticism. "Ray" is music.

Rating:
Summary: a short, more bitter than sweet, good read
Review: Short enough to be a great "filler" book when you're between novels, Ray by Barry Hannah ends up being worth the read. It is written almost like journal entries of a man with enough rotten memory to be spilling his guts to a much-needed psychologist. This book is like the average southern man's Bible, filled with the honest greusomeness of every day life in a backwoods town. Loose women, alcohol, love, hate, murder, and death.
Ray, a doctor and war survivor, recaps on his life which consists of mostly adultery and drinking, injected with a few small crisis moments that keep the book interesting.
Very very honest, well written, Barry Hannah couldn't have verbalized the events in this book better!