Ethan Hawke Books

Gold was found in Alaska, the rush to obtain it required a strong constitution and many dogs to do the work that horses usually did in the states. The environment bread harsh attitudes. Also in the testing of ones mettle one finds their true potential.

Buck (a dog that is half St Bernard and half Shepherd) goes through many lives, trials, and tribulations finally realizing his potential. On the way he learns many concepts from surprise, to deceit, and cunning; he also learns loyalty, devotion, and love. As he is growing he feels the call of the wild.

This book is well written. There is not a wasted word or thought and the story while building on its self has purpose and direction. The descriptions may be a tad graphic for the squeamish and a tad sentimental for the romantic. You see the world through Buck's eyes and understand it through his perspective until you also feel the call of the wild.

The Call of the Wild - Dog of the Yukon (1997)

i think the editorial review was a little bit off for this story, it's not 'a story of a boy and his wolf' its a story of a dog, various humans(owners), and the dogs transition eventually to a wolf pack. so i don't know whatthey were talking about.

This is a profound and beautiful book. Ulrich Baer, editor and translator of the volume has gone through the more than seven- thousand letters Rilke wrote in his lifetime and selected those he felt had the most to say about living and loving in the world. He orders the letters into sections which begin with his title and are followed by a line from Rilke.

1) On LIfe and Living You have to live life to the limit
2) On Being with others To be a Part, that is Fulfillment for us
3)On Work: Get up Cheerfully on Days You have to Work
4) On Difficulty and Adversity The Measure by which we may know our Strength
5)On Childhood and Education; This Joy in Daily Discovery
6) On Nature It Knows Nothing of Us
7)On Solitude The Lonest People Above all Contribute Most to Commonality
8)On Illness and Recovery Pain Tolerates No Interpretation
9)On Loss, Dying and Death Even Time Does not 'Console' It puts things in Place and creates Order
10) On Language That Vast, Humming and Swinging Syntax
11)On Art Art Presents Itself as a Way of Life
12) On Faith A Direction of the Heart
13) On Goodness and Morality Nothing Good, Once it Has Come into Existence May be Suppressed
14) On Love There is no Force in the World but Love

In his rich repetitive introduction to the volume Baer discusses the special place letter-writing had in Rilke's life and work. Rilke in his letters has a spontaneity and poetic freedom beyond that in his very disciplined and exacting poems. But of course the themes of both forms of writing are common ones, and the letters a source of ideas and inspirations for the Poetry. What distinguishes the Letters from another form Rilke used to great advantage ' the Diary' is the consciousness of the 'you' at the other end.
Baer suggests one particular strength of Rilke's writing in the Letters is his nuanced awareness of the person at the other end, and his ability to reach out and feel and know how to express a message which will resonate in the heart of the recipient.
Baer gives a picture of Rilke the legendary Poet- waiting for the fruit to ripen ,as most notably in the great period in which he suddenly in weeks time wrote the 'Duino Elegies' and 'Sonnets to Orpheus'- in contrast to the daily workman letter-writing Rilke. Baer underlines that Rilke expresses in the letters his own rare and special vision of life, one which conjoins the everyday with the cosmic, which feels in the rhythms of rhyme our inner rhythm of biology and mind, which senses in its internalization of the worlds objects a fullness of being and lived life. Baer presents the picture of a poet of holy immanence whose idea of the aesthetic is not in the pretty only, but who forges and finds beauty in the ugly aspects of reality also.
Baer also tells the not always admirable tale of Rilke's personal life, the marriage to Clara Westhoff, the birth of their sole daughter Ruth, Rilke's abandonment of them, his seeking out his own fate but not without his fawning at aristocratic patrons, his love of love but often cruel abandonment of those loved, his loyalty to his own faith and vocation as poet, his apprentice- admiring relationship with Rodin and wisdom in being free of it, his great fame. And what is in a way most touching his keeping in touch through the letters as he deepened into a solitude which for him was far more blessing than curse.
It seems there now is a fashion started perhaps by Alain de Botton with his volume on Proust, of selecting out from the total work of great literary creators passages best encapsulating their wisdom and vision of life.
Many of the statements of this volume may seem exaggerated and in need of qualification. Yet even these statements are richly poetically suggestive. The work of a great poet for whom ripeness is within, and richness in feeling infuses all.

" The strings of sorrow may only be used extensively if one vows to play on them also at a later point and in their particular key all of the joyousness that accumulates behind everything that is difficult, painful and that we had to suffer, and without which the voices are not complete."

"I believe that one is never more just than at those moments when one admires unreservedly and with absolute devotion. It is in this spirit of unchecked admiration that the few great individuals whom our time was unable to stifle ought to be presented, precisely because ourage has become so very good at assuming a critical stance."

"After all, life is not even close to being as logically consistent as our worries; it has many more unexpected ideas and faces than we do."

Following "Slaughterhouse Five," Kurt Vonnegut swore off novels. In the introduction to his 1970 play, "Happy Birthday, Wanda June," Vonnegut quotes himself: "I'm left-handed now, and I'm through with Novels. I'm writing a play. It's plays from now on." Thankfully he didn't keep this promise. "Breakfast of Champions" appeared a mere three years later. An eye blink in time. Maybe Vonnegut thought he couldn't outdo his 1969 masterpiece? His Everest was conquered, so to say. Understandable, because "Slaughterhouse Five" remains his most quoted, chatted about, and revered book. And though it fits square-peg square-hole right into his body of work, he never wrote anything else quite like it. Next year it turns 40. It has had a difficult life. Some potty-mouthed irreverent language made it anathema to didactic schoolmarms and the straight-laced. But controversy usually bites back, and the book entered the national spotlight. Censorship has always fueled sales. Even back then. Business 101.

"Slaughterhouse Five" tells the story of a secular messiah optometrist, Billy Pilgrim. Like Vonnegut, who appears as the "I" and "me" throughout the book, Pilgrim was in a bomb shelter when Allied forces firebombed the cultural haven of Dresden to absolute smithereens. Historical descriptions are ghastly. Though the German government later revised the initial estimates of 135,000 dead to around 35,000, it remains a brutal massacre nonetheless. Pilgrim comes to Dresden via the Battle of the Bulge where he and his companions are captured and shipped in miserable rail cars to a prison camp. There, proud and hearty British officers feed and entertain them until the Nazis transfer Pilgrim's unit to Dresden as laborers. Once there, they sleep in "Schlachthof-fünf," or "Slaughterhouse Five," where meat was once processed. Soon after, the city gets drenched in flames as the prisoners sit helplessly in subterranean bomb shelters. Horror awaits them when they emerge. Dresden now looks like the surface of the moon.

Though Dresden's destruction undoubtedly provided the inspiration for Vonnegut's magnum opus, the story focuses more on the life of Pilgrim and his revelations on temporality. But being a "witness" to Dresden carries far-reaching implications. And there is nothing linear about this narrative or its implications. It begins, famously, with the line "Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time." Like Christ, on who he's loosely modeled (hints abound throughout the text, though this is by no means a religious book), Pilgrim has "good news" for humanity. Good news about time and the impact of death. We've been wrong all along, it turns out. After surviving Dresden, becoming a rich and successful optometrist, Pilgrim gets abducted by aliens in 1967. They take him 446,120,000,000,000,000 miles from earth. There he becomes the center of attention, the supposed "perfect specimen" of humanity. Even his urinating causes cheering. In short, he's in an alien zoo. These aliens, known as Tralfamadorians, give Pilgrim a new view of time. Time isn't linear, they tell him. It's total. Every moment has always existed and always will exist. So we live forever. On top of that, in the zoo Pilgrim gets to mate with a human hottie: Montana Wildhack (as opposed to Valencia, the unattractive woman he marries for money and stability). All of his dreams come true. He no longer fears death (presented as violet light and a hum). He's free, and he wants to tell the world. Of course humanity, including his own daughter, consider him nuts. Pilgrim has internalized this philosophy of time, and he jumps from one episode of his life to another, seemingly at random. Only Kilgore Trout seems to understand.

Pilgrim's view of time provides the novel's main tension and theme: the old hoary question of free will and determinism. The Tralfamadorians are deep determinisists. In fact, Earth represents the only planet they know of where talk of "free will" occurs. They provide the mouthpiece for one of Vonnegut's most poignant lines: "Well, here we are, Mr. Pilgrim, trapped in the amber of this moment. There is no why." Such passages have led to debates concerning the novel's view of free will. Was Vonnegut denying free will? Does he think we have any control over our destiny? The novel doesn't take sides. Instead, it presents a middle path in the form of a brilliant Vonnegut cartoon. A locket hangs between two potato shaped breasts - Montana Wildhack's breasts. It reads: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom always to tell the difference." So are we free or determined? Both. The most important thing humans can do is know the limits of our powers. Some things we can change, other things we cannot. With this masterstroke, Vonnegut also helps redeem the often disparaged medium of cartoons.

Finally, no discussion of "Slaughterhouse Five" can ignore the book's most ubiquitous phrase: "So it goes." Vonnegut inserts this laconic quip whenever a death occurs. Some have interpreted this move as making light of or as dismissing the impact of mortality. But this repetitive leitmotif can also produce the opposite effect: it can magnify death's impact by simple repetition. After finishing the book, "So it goes" will likely linger in the head for days. Though "so it goes" represents and calls attention to death, it nonetheless reads as humor, but as "naughty humor" evoking hesitant or guilty laughter. Many critics have described Vonnegut's work as a perfect combination of funny and sad. This aptly describes the effect of "So it goes." Likely "Slaughterhouse Five," a deceptively easy read, will stand as Vonnegut's major work as long as people continue to read twentieth century literature. Sadly, Vonnegut passed away in 2007. One is tempted to say "so it goes," but unaccompanied by laughter. All one can say is thanks for this book, Kurt, and everything else.

Thoroughly enjoyed the book. Have wanted to read it for years. Ordering and shipping very efficient. Thank You

One of the first 'science fiction' books I ever read. Really whet my appetite for the genre. Vonnegut does not sacrifice character development for quirks of plot. Surprisingly easy to follow, despite all the jumping about in time.

It is not my usual stuff but it had some interesting ideas. I have to admit though that I checked out the Spark Notes just to make sure I was keeping up with everything. The "getting unstuck" and traveling back and forth through time was a bit nerve racking but in the end, I understood why he did it. At least I think I do. Either Vonnegut is a literary genius or a complete fool. Judging from his popularity though I am going to say that it is the former. If not, we are all the latter.

The man known as Kurt Vonnegut is an absolute genius with the pen. I will admit that the first chapter of this story is very drab and unappealing to read but it is still an amazing novel in the middle. The detail that Vonnegut puts into all of his characters is amazing; no matter how unimportant they are to the story he still adds enough description so that you can picture the characters in your head. The way that the book jumps from one place in time to another is amazingly done. This book has its sad parts and its glad parts but all the parts when put together make an awesome book.

Superbit=god.

Well not really, but you get my point.

Does anyone else see the correlation between the letters of the title and DNA sequences? A friend pointed this out to me, I hadn't noticed before.

Love, love, LOVE this movie. Probably one of my top three. If you have half a brain, you should probably own it.

This movie needs to be watch at least twice, in order to capture all the nuances of the detailed plot, the cinematography, and the superb acting. I never, ever get tired of watching this movie.

This movie is a post modern classic. Wonderfully filmed, with a great story. It is not science fiction, though it might sort of fit the genre. It is more along the lines of Farenheit 451, a Clock Work Orange, and 1984.

I bought this movie to show my class of lower level bio kids, generally kids who are checked out of school. Some of the details had to be reviewed that they didn't quite understand, but they understood the movie overall. Even better, the discussion we had after the movie was AMAZING. They really were able to relate the movie well to modern issues and many were able to uncover the layers of symbolism and imagery in the film. There were more than a few comments that caused me to respond "I hadn't even thought about that!" This was a much better vehicle for thinking about ethical issues realted to technology than any article I could have found. We are also relating parts of the movie to our new unit on genetics, something I hadn't even anticipated would happen. Overall, I would highly recommend this film for other bio teachers to use during their DNA units.

At first glance, it may look like any other film. But it truly is a sci-fi film and a brilliant one at that. People in the future can choose to have the perfect baby, without ailments and without defects. This is a story of one man, who wasn't so lucky. Ethan Hawke is broodingly perfect in this. His heartfelt performance really carries this film. Jude Law's small but heartbreaking role should not be missed either. Yes its sci-fi, but its so unconventional, you don't need to be a fan to watch this, or vice versa. Its dramatic and depressing and often beautiful too.

Superbit=god.

Well not really, but you get my point.

Does anyone else see the correlation between the letters of the title and DNA sequences? A friend pointed this out to me, I hadn't noticed before.

Love, love, LOVE this movie. Probably one of my top three. If you have half a brain, you should probably own it.

This movie needs to be watch at least twice, in order to capture all the nuances of the detailed plot, the cinematography, and the superb acting. I never, ever get tired of watching this movie.

This movie is a post modern classic. Wonderfully filmed, with a great story. It is not science fiction, though it might sort of fit the genre. It is more along the lines of Farenheit 451, a Clock Work Orange, and 1984.

I bought this movie to show my class of lower level bio kids, generally kids who are checked out of school. Some of the details had to be reviewed that they didn't quite understand, but they understood the movie overall. Even better, the discussion we had after the movie was AMAZING. They really were able to relate the movie well to modern issues and many were able to uncover the layers of symbolism and imagery in the film. There were more than a few comments that caused me to respond "I hadn't even thought about that!" This was a much better vehicle for thinking about ethical issues realted to technology than any article I could have found. We are also relating parts of the movie to our new unit on genetics, something I hadn't even anticipated would happen. Overall, I would highly recommend this film for other bio teachers to use during their DNA units.

At first glance, it may look like any other film. But it truly is a sci-fi film and a brilliant one at that. People in the future can choose to have the perfect baby, without ailments and without defects. This is a story of one man, who wasn't so lucky. Ethan Hawke is broodingly perfect in this. His heartfelt performance really carries this film. Jude Law's small but heartbreaking role should not be missed either. Yes its sci-fi, but its so unconventional, you don't need to be a fan to watch this, or vice versa. Its dramatic and depressing and often beautiful too.

Mr. Lasser writes a compelling tale about people. The premise is baseball, which admittedly is a subject that doesn't interest me, but in spite of that, I really enjoyed the book. A true work of literature, and not just another mindless page-turner, this high-quality work is haunting and yet strangely uplifting.

An ardent baseball fan, I found this book to be something of a disappointment. While the book certainly lacks little in its description of the details of the game and those involved in it, the plot and characters never seem to ascend beyond cliche. The ending, too, left me wanting for something not just more, but better. A decent first effort for Lasser, but the there are many in the catalog of written works about baseball that I have found more engrossing and enjoyable than Battle Creek.

Like baseball, this book can be enjoyed at a very basic level. Unlike baseball however, Battle Creek lacks the depth and complexity to be treated as much more than a pleasant diversion. I sped through Battle Creek quickly and easily, without having to put too much thought into it. Being a Michigander, and a baseball fan, Battle Creek should have grabbed me and not let go. Instead, it merely guided be through page after page of everyday life. The characters were drawn well enough, they just never really popped from the pages. The baseball scenes seemed realistic and the relationships possible, if not a little shallow. I have no real complaints about this book. Likewise, I wouldn't call a friend to tell them to read it either. Instead, I'd suggest that anyone looking for real baseball reading pick up Bart Giamatti's "A Great and Glorious Game" and read the first essay, "The Green Fields of the Mind." That four page masterpiece contains more human drama, baseball knowledge and rich prose than Battle Creek achieves in over 200 pages.

Battle Creek joins Bang the Drum Slowly and The Natural in its exploration of the lure and costs of baseball on the American psyche. Focusing on the final season of generationally-sandwiched head coach Gil Davison, the novelist Scott Lasser is at his best when the themes of competition and success mingle with the tensions engendered in families which do not function well. His descriptions of his terminally ill father are, to me, the strongest aspect of the novel.

In addition, his evocative narrative of actual games reveal a man who knows and respects the beauty of baseball. Unfortunately, the women who populate his novel are distressingly unidimensional: either poetically detached or built like centerfolds (with little personality or intelligence to attract them to readers who would prefer "real" women to affected groupies).

Nevertheless, I commend the novel for its exploration into the darker sides of our character, our obsessions with winning and our delusions as to how much victory truly means.

I became so immediately involved with the characters in this story that I forgot I was reading a book about baseball and men's lives ... I was completely engaged in everything about the story, and hated to see it end ... Thanks to Scott Lasser's amazing craft for characterization, I am now intrigued with baseball and the players and looking for an amateur baseball game, as well as Scott Lasser's next novel...

All of The Whole Story books are fantastic. My eighth graders love to read these because they enjoy the sideline information and pictorials that help them to better grasp the story. I bought a classroom set and have already requested for our school to invest in Tom Sawyer by this same company. Great Idea!

This is not a good version for a classroom setting. The cover doesn't reveal this.

The call of the wild, by Jack London is a great book for all ages. Buck (the main character) is a tame dog in Santa Clara California living with Judge Miller, a man that everyone new and enjoyed. This changed when a rush for gold in Yukon made men need strong dogs to pull their sleds. Buck was a very strong dog and as a result, was kidnapped. He was then taken to Yukon where there was harsh snow and was very cold. He was treated poorly until he met John Thorton. John Thorton was very kind to Buck but then one day he died. Buck was left in the wild and became friends with a wild animal. I personally like it because it is always telling you what is happining in great detail. Jack London also got right to the point making it easy to understand.

The call of the wild by Jack London is a great book for all ages. Buck (the main character) is a tame dog in Santa Clara California living with Judge Miller a man that evryone new and enjoyed. All this changed when a rush for gold in Yukon. These men needed strong dogs and because of the fact Buck was strong he was kidnapped. He was then tuck to Yukon where there was harsh snow and was very cold. he was treated poorly intill he met John Thorton. John Thorton was very kind to Buck but then one day he died. Buck was left in the wild and became friends with a wild animal and learned to live in the wild.

After reading "The Call of the Wild" or more precisely, after being transferred to another place and time, or even more to the point after being totally submerged into the being of this animal, I'm left completely awe-struck by London's work.

To see what Buck saw, to feel the forces and the instincts that he felt... that is the power of this book. Here's a passage from the third chaper to illustrate what I mean:

"At the mouth of the Tahkeena, one night after super, Dub (a member of the sled-dog team) turned up a snowshoe rabbit, blundered it, and missed. A hundred yards away was a camp of the Northwest Police, with fifty dogs, huskies all, who joined the chase. The rabbit sped down the river, turned off into a small creek, up the frozen bed of which it held steadily. It ran lightly on the surface of the snow, while the dogs plowed through by main strength. Buck led the pack, sixty strong, around bend after bend, but he could not gain. He lay down low to the race, whining eagerly, his splendid body flashing forward, leap by leap, in the wan white moonlight. And leap by leap, like some pale frost wraith, the snowshoe rabbit flashed on ahead.

All the stirring of old instincts which at stated periods drives men out from the sounding cities to forest and plain to kill things by chemically propelled leaden pellets, the blood lust, the joy to kill--all this was Buck's, only it was infinitely more intimate. He was ranging at the head of the pack, running the wild thing down, the living meat, to kill with his own teeth and wash his muzzle to the eyes in warm blood.

There is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life, and beyond which life cannot rise. And such is the paradox of living, this ecstasy comes when one is most alive, and it comes as a complete forgetfulness that one is alive. This ecstasy, this forgetfulness of living, comes to the artist, caught up and out of himself in a sheet of flame; it comes to the soldier, war-mad on a stricken field and refusing quarter; it came to Buck, leading the pack, sounding the old wolf-cry, straining after the food that was alive and that fled swiftly before him through the moonlight. He was sounding the deeps of his nature, and of the parts of his nature that were deeper than he, going back into the womb of Time. He as mastered by the sheer surging of life, the tidal wave of being, the perfect joy of each separate muscle, joint, and sinew in that it was everything that was not death, that it was aglow and rampant, expressing itself in movement, flying exultantly under the stars and over the face of dead matter that did not move."

The editorial review and the publishers weekley review are very poorly made. Publishers w. talks about when william returns from Paris, when its Mexico. Did they see the movie? I don't think so.
The story is very human and sincere, there is very good music. There is one scene where william walks by a movie house and you see that " Paris texas" is playing, and thats a very good movie.

Hawke is a excellent storyteller. He has a long career in writing if he chooses to and for our sake I hope he does continue to write. If you like this book you will love his "Ash Wednesday".

When I bought this book, I was really excited to read something by Ethan Hawke because I knew he was very intelligent and very opinionated. He's also very perceptive about life and emotions. This book left me with a lot of good impressions. Several times throughout the book, he had these one-liners that seemed to be like secrets to life. I used to share those with my friends because I thought they were sensational. I think Ethan's been writing for a long time because all of his thoughts they just flow onto the page so honestly and he gives enough of an idea of each character so the reader can picture exactly who these people are.

Generally, Ethan likes to write about love and figuring out the meaning of life (which he generally points back to love). It's fun to read no matter what your age, although he does use cuss words a bit.

I'm the type that likes those poignant art flicks that Hawke ends up in. His choice in movies, and often the dialog his characters are given lead me to think he's one of the intellectual crowd. Thus, I expected the novel to be a bit heavy handed, almost classic in nature and a bit pretentious. For better or for worse, I found it wasn't.

His style is striaghtforward and down to earth. At times the sections end like the powerful last line of a poem, as if he wants the last word in an arguement before walking out the door (a common thing in stage and film, so it's not surprising it occurs in his prose). But most of the time, it's just honest writing.

In a way it owes itself to the pulp writers like Hammet, not that it's full of the vernacular of the noir, but in that he doesn't waste much time defining the settings, the clothing, the articles in the rooms, but more focuses on character development. And gladly he does a fine job of defining his characters not by telling, but by action.

This is a story about young love, and immature naive young love at that. About a Holden Caufield in his mid 20's, falling for damaged goods and not having the experience and wisdom yet to see her for what she is.

Mostly I appreciated the novel because of the realistic characters (at least realistic from my own life experiences, yours may differ), and the easy flow of the writing. At times, also like Hammet, I'd find passages that read like good poetry - bits of wisdom coming from a perspective unique to me, told in a style that is both rough and also graceful.

Much fame has come to writers like Dan Brown and Robert Ludlum, because their plots are strong and intriguing. However, those airline novelists fail miserably when it comes to voice. Reading them is like listening to Beethoven performed by a high school band.

This novel reads in the reverse. The plot is simple, there's not a great amount of complexity or surprises. However, it's well done, well paced, well performed, like a Bob Dylan tune being performed by a Norah Jones.

The joy is in the style, honesty and the integrity to the writing, even if the subject matter has been covered before, and the chords are familiar triads.

By the same author...

1. Watch Me In This Lonely Corner
2. Oh My Love, Oh My Dearest Darling--I Pine For You--PINE!
3. How To Trick Yourself Into Thinking You're Still 15
5. How To Feel Sorry For Ethan Hawke
6. The Secret Garden
7. Self-Indulgence: a Primer
8. Tori Amos: EarthQueenGoddessMother
9. Prozac Nation
10. Oh Life! Oh Love! Oh Eternity!

I picked this book up the other day, and although I haven't finished it, it's pretty obvious (to me anyway) that he's not just some "actor" who thought he would take a crack at writing a few novels while trading off his name. It's clear he understands the fundamentals of strong, tight prose and that he has put in the time to learn how to see those fundamentals are adhered to. His sentence structure is strong, as is his grammar (despite what other reviewers have said), and, honestly, I find myself a little jealous of his talent.

What's interesting to me are some of the scathing comments found under the heading of this page. It seems to me that these reviewers are almost fixated on the fact that he is a well known actor (and a very good one, let's face it). Who cares? In fact, in many of these reviewers' minds that bit of information somehow cripples his potential as a writer. I just don't see it. If anything, it only helps him create more believable characters while making the most subtle of description choices. I'm almost positive it works the other way with his acting, too. Think Training Day. Think Before The Devil Knows You're Dead. Tell me I'm wrong.

If you want to find a sample of what I'm talking about in his writing, though, just open this book to Chapter Four. The opening is a very good example of what I mean. He says a lot about the state of mind of the protagonist without drawing it out too much. He does the same with the description of the protagonist's mother. Tight, tight, tight. It's really almost masterful.

Bottom line. I can't help but feel that if he wasn't already an established actor, his literary work wouldn't be held under such a bright light. I also feel that some of these negative reviewers, who are assuredly writers themselves, would do well to learn from his brevity.

This novel is what would happen if a jazz-less, dyslexic Jack Kerouac collided head on with an adolescent version of Tom Wolfe. Hawke's prose hustles along in a cute, jingly-jangley sort of way stuck somewhere between immature versions of the above mentioned authors. This novel isn't bad, but it isn't good either. We see genuine flashes of exceptional writing, but a lack of consistency. The story is occasionally graceful, but the characters often present themselves as clichés. Hawke manages to tell his story but at no point does a definitive, individualized style present itself. Ethan never puts his stamp on this one and we're reminded that good writing simply has to move beyond what we've read and experienced before.

Ethan Hawke's novel is sexy, dry and cool, as two likeable characters road trip through America, the inner workings of their relationship and self-knowedge. It is a little too trying to be Catcher in the R for me at times, and although both characters are reasonably strong and real, it eventuated for me as merely an insight into the developing self-understanding (with sometimes-inspired philosophical revelations attached) of two young people and how they relate to each other, and not much else. I need my novels to soar higher than that, Hawke. Three stars.

This is a rare beast of a book, as it gets better the more times one reads it, please check your ego at the door, because Mr.Hawke is an actor, and read this book as you would any other book whom you do not know its author. The narrator is a charming mix of alpha-male and hopeless romantic, Mr.Hawke is a fresh and promising voice and i look forward to reading more from this talented author..

Jimmy is far from perfect, but he now knows that Christy, who he'd recently split up with, is perfect for him and that he's ready to commit to her.

What he doesn't know is that Christy is carrying Jimmy's baby, and that she's not going to let him back into her life that easily.

As they travel across America, Jimmy tries to show Christy that he loves her and how far he's willing to go for them to be a family.

Hawke seems to really care for his characters: he represents them honestly, but without being critical or judgmental of them, and that made the characters really come alive for me. All in all, a touching read.