Customer Reviews

The Rum Diary: A Novel

5 star:		(79)
4 star:		(50)
3 star:		(26)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

This is the "lost novel" by Hunter S. Thompson, a book that he started writing in 1959 to make a quick buck. He struggled all through the sixties to get this thing rewritten and published, but because of its quality and Thompson's legendary shakedowns with agents, publishers, and contracts, it died on the vine - until a few years ago. This quasi-fictional account of a New York reporter drifting into a job at the San Juan Daily News is somewhat based on Thompson's experience on the Carribean island in the late 1950. Trying to put Puerto Rico on the literary map like Hemingway did for Paris, he spells out a story of corruption, boredom, and alcohol in a more simple San Juan, before the big booms of the travel booms and technology of the sixties. Paul Kemp, the fictional narrator, describes the coworkers, women, natives, and insane government, riddled with syndicates and kickbacks. The writing here isn't like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - it's more of the Orwell/Mailer/Miller genre, and does a good job of painting memorable scenes of the insanity, camaraderie, poverty, and drunkenness on top of the tropical backdrop. It's not bad stuff, and I wonder if it recently went through heavy rewrites, or if there just wasn't a market for it back in the sixties. Either way, it's a light, fast read at just over 200 pages, and made me wonder if Thompson's other unpublished work would be as satisfying in a trade hardcover. Maybe someday?

I came to the good old Doctor probably like the good old Doctor comes into life after a drunken night living on his fortified compound near Puerto Rico(book jacket) -- not knowing what to expect.

But I'm glad I crashed my first Thompson novel -- it's a wicked cool party. Some of the passages are just like wine on a Sunday afternoon - "All manner of Men came to work for the News: everything from wild young Turks who wanted to rip the world in half and start all over again-to tired, beer- bellied old hacks who wanted nothing more than to live out their days in peace before a bunch of lunactics ripped the world in half."

The book continues on like this for a quick 204 pages, with Thompson occasionally digging up such gems of lines. It's a wild, brash adventure that doesn't seem dated, and stirs up all the feelings about what fiction should be.

This novel is like a film noir script. The prose is terse. The characters are tragic, but don't evoke much in the way of pity. You see them go down and you think "well, it figures".

What I like most about this book was its ability to evoke a time, a place and a certain demographic. San Juan in the late 50s must have been a blast if you were young, American and basically looking for an exotic good time without the bother of getting a passport or changing your money.

If Paul Kemp is Thompson's alter ego, then HST was impressively candid about what a worthless rake he was. I suspect that Kemp is a composite of the worst tendencies of Thompson and several other guys from the same crowd. No eternal verities are even hinted at in this book. If there was one iota of "hey this is literature" in this book, then it would be truly bad. On the contrary, it is just a well-written story about a shabby life.

Hunter S. Thompson's "The Rum Diary" is knows as "The Long Lost Novel", and since it is such an entertaining book that we all should be grateful that it was found. Written when he was only 22, the novel is a very down-to-earth account of a young man's experience of working as a journalist in Puerto Rico circa 1960.

Paul Kemp is a thirty-ish with no much hope for his futures. He leaves his New York and moves to Puerto Rico, to work in the only local newspaper published in English. Far from a wealthy reality he dawns in a mad world of drinking, love, jealousy and other insane things, mostly with the help of his journalist friends, until he goes as down as possible and realizes it is time he grew up. Or not.

Written in fine prose with the speed of someone who devours a barrel of rum, "The Rum Diary" is Thompson at his best. His first novel has more stamina, imagination, passion and truth that many experienced writers will never acquire. Writing as someone who knows the cause, the author is able to create believable characters and situations. Anyone who has spend a week in a newspaper knows that there are all kind of people self-proclaiming journalists, not to mention yelling editors going insane all the time, and demanding heads off every day.

We can find in the book --and in real life-- every sort of weirdos that are trying to find a better existence somewhere else far from home. These outsiders that inhabit Thompson's novel are the real thing, which paints a vivid portrait of people thorn between the passion of being a journalist and the fear of never acquiring any real thing in life. Deep inside this is the moral dilema that comsumes Kemp. While on one hand he has the freedon he always wanted, on the other there is fear of the newspaper being folder and losing his job with nothing in that strange country. While this doesn't happen, he can consume himself with many shots of rum at Al's.

With such a realistic portray, Thompson throws his readers to the heart of this late coming-of-age tale, set in an exotic land in difficult times. Political and economical issues are in the background of the tale taking it to another level, making the book not only fun to read, but also important. The constant riots between local people and foreign journalist only prove that Puerto Rico was an incendiary place, in many levels.

However, "The Rum Diary" is not a novel with wide appeal, most people won't identify themselves with the events and the characters and will be put off. But those who can stick with Thompson's masterful narrative will have fun all the time.

Brilliant first novel by the great Doctor of journalism. Funny, immoral, decadent, plenty of alcohol and madness. What else could you expect from HST? Although the main character Paul Kemp is not fully developed and two dimensional, it was a terrific novel. Liked it better than A Sun Also Rises. If you're a fan of HST, then it is your moral duty to read this book!

The Doctor of Journalism finds the American Dream in the most unlikely of all places in Hunter S. Thompson's, The Rum Diary. Not only does Thompson portray the American Dream in an alcholic frenzied environment, but finds it in Puerto Rico. Although this is not a typical Dr.Gonzo prose, The Rum Diary confronts conformity and shares a few drinks with him. A simple tale of middle-aged journalist, trying to find out the meaning of his existence, while at the same time, traveling thru exotic lands. This is honestly one of the best books that i have ever read. After getting through the first couple of chapters, i found that i couldnt put it down. If anything, this novel has the same type of storyline as in Hemingway's, 'The Sun Also Rises.' Anyone who rates this book under five stars, doesn not know what they are talking about.

Thompson's thinly veiled self-acknowledged portrayal of a journalist - Paul Kemp - who leaves New York to go working for a folding newspaper, the San Juan Daily News - is a largely ignored piece of work. This is largely due to its pre-gonzo style that will alienate most of the fans who have been seduced by his later works - most notably Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

However, there was much more to Thompson's methodical writing than 'gonzo' (see his earlier letters for example). Sure, his influences do include Hemingway, and this is most notable in The Rum Diary, but Thompson manages to capture a boozy, sleazy, sun-soaked world full of typical Thompson creatures.

The Rum Diary was actually written in the late 50s - early 60s, however it remained unpublished until the later years when Thompson's name was enough to give it a seal of quality. This is not to say that this novel is just a cash in for Thompson. Reading his letters at the time, he sweated blood to try and get this piece of work published, despite rewriting it many, many times. Also, judging by his letters, he was immensley proud of this book and - as a desperate poverty striken writer without much work - he became disillusioned with publishers and the writing world in general on its lack of success.

The novel simmers along at a subtle pace leading to an edgy - and quite shocking - climax at a street festival. Early characteristics of Thompson's style do break through - most notably the drunken madness and brawls that the antagonist gets involved in.

"When the sun got hot enough it burned away all the illusions and I saw the place as it was - cheap, sullen, and garish - nothing good was going to happen here."

first i gotta say that this is by far my favorite book ever. there are so many things i love about it:

i don't know how dr. thompson does it but reading this book i felt like the main character, paul kemp, himself. though not always getting along with his life in puerto rico, he approaches life in a way that makes me feel like nothing can ever go too wrong.

the athmospere that the author creates makes you feel like being on a tropical island yourself and reading this book you just wanna sit there yourself and have a drink of rum.

i wished this book would have never ended - this story about a guy i can identify with, a guy who only wants to be at peace with where he lives. a guy who doesn't care at all.

don't miss it, this could change your life...

This is the story of a lost reporter working for a dead end newspaper finding adventure in 1950s San Juan. On the surface, a story that only Jimmy Buffett could love.

What makes this story special is the view it gives you to pre-Gonzo Hunter S. Thompson. The story is wild, frayed, on the verge of unbelievable, but it is not yet Gonzo. In a sense, it a first look at the hypermanic greatness to come, written in a more sane and moderately paced prose.

I must admit that at first, I almost put this book down pretty quickly. HST's character meets a woman and has sex with her on the beach. It struck me as a bit too "penthouse forum" and immature. But I kept reading and I am very glad that I did. This book portrays an HST before he was a notorious personality, before he became the journalist for the drug & counter-cultures.

HST was young when he originally wrote this book, only in his early twenties. With that in mind, the writing style, sensitivity to detail, and compelling storytelling are quite amazing! I got lost in this book, and at times I could even smell the Rum!

Though this is not HST's "Fear and Loathing...", Gonzo-style, it is a must-read for new and old fan's, as well as for people who might be turned off by HST's more popular, drug-addled persona. The Rum Diary shows that he is in fact a great story-teller & excellent novelist.

Last year I re-read "Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas" for the first time since I first discovered it over twenty years ago. I am a completely different person than I was when I originally read it, but the story and the writing hold up. I believe that the same can, and will be said of The Rum Diary.