Two decades after writing the acclaimed Nickel Miseries and Sick Friends, Ivan Gold has broken his silence and produced a novel which brings back the character Jason Sams. Combining fiction and memoir about triumph over the blackness of alcoholism, Sams in a Dry Season tracks Jason as he drowns in liquor and then, after several eye-opening experiences, puts down the bottle for good.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Two decades after his promising '60s debut, Gold makes a welcome return, distilling his own bout with alcoholism into the story of Jason Sams, failed writer and hopeless drunk.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
In Sick Friends (1969), Gold's first novel, Sixties writer Jason Sams cheerfully admitted to being a sex fiend and an alcoholic. Now, in 1976, writing and sex are dim memories and drinking controls his life. Fired from a demeaning job at a Boston university, Sams heads for New York City to re-establish contact with the publishing world. This goal is quickly forgotten, however, and the trip degenerates into a sodden tour of liquor stores and taverns in search of the elusive India Ale. Gold has the psychology of alcoholism down cold, and the first half of this book invites comparison with Charles Jackson's classic The Lost Weekend . Unfortunately, the book's final chapters--which compress eight years of AA meetings and Antabuse into an optimistic coda--detract from the overall effect. This last-minute change of genre makes the novel more appropriate for substance-abuse collections than for general fiction collections.
- Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
- Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Highly recommended! - Deserves to be a film,
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This review is from: Sams in a Dry Season: Sams in a Dry Season (Paperback)
Ivan Gold's most recent novel is a haunting, elegaic, and also quite funny novel - a brave book, too, as Philip Roth callled it. It is indeed a story of triumph over alcoholism but without the "Lost Weekend" melodrama or contemporary cliches. More important, it is an engaging and painfully honest treatment of its hero's taking stock and taking control of his life. Consisting essentially of a series of vivid set-pieces - the opening encounter between Jason Sams and his English Department chair is especially brilliant - this book will stay with you for a long time. Its characters and scenes are memorable; its prose full of both play and grace.
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Inside This Book
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First Sentence:
JASON SAMS, in danger of losing his job (not ready to admit it was already lost), deemed it high time to return to the literary wars. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Slow Dying, Jason Sams, Boston Globe, Ballantine India Ale, Copley Square, Lower East Side, South Station, Alcoholics Anonymous, Brookline Avenue, Colonial Hall, English Department, Fourth Avenue, Peter Luger, University of London, Beacon Hill, Greenwich Village, Madison Avenue, Old South Church, Paul Revere, Penn Station, Third Avenue, United States, World Series New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
JASON SAMS, in danger of losing his job (not ready to admit it was already lost), deemed it high time to return to the literary wars. Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Slow Dying, Jason Sams, Boston Globe, Ballantine India Ale, Copley Square, Lower East Side, South Station, Alcoholics Anonymous, Brookline Avenue, Colonial Hall, English Department, Fourth Avenue, Peter Luger, University of London, Beacon Hill, Greenwich Village, Madison Avenue, Old South Church, Paul Revere, Penn Station, Third Avenue, United States, World Series New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
Citations (learn more)
This book cites 11
books:
See all 11 books this book cites
3
books
cite this book:
- Slow Dying (Apache) by William M. James on page 12
- Nickel Miseries by Ivan Gold in Front Matter
- Remembrance of Things Past Volumes 1-3 Box Set by Marcel Proust on page 239
- Empire Builders by Vian on page 190
- The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James on page 12
See all 11 books this book cites
- The Languages of Addiction by Jane Lilienfeld on page 11, and page 13
- Sick Friends by Ivan Gold in Front Matter
- The White Logic: Alcoholism and Gender in American Modernist Fiction by John W. Crowley on page 156
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