Customer Reviews

The Temple of Gold

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Being 29, I do not carry the bias of nostalgia that other reviewers may hold. This book was published 13 years before I was born, but the subject matter is timeless. There have always been(and will forever be) teens who become disillusioned with life. Goldman has created, in Raymond Euripides Trevitt, a character with whom most of us can connect. He doesn't relate, or effectively comminicate, with his parents. He finds it easier to burn bridges than to appear emotionally vulnerable. We follow him through a tremendous friendship with a kid named Zock, several girlfriends(relationships ranging from purely physical, hollow offerings to that exaggerated brand of heartache & tragedy that seems to've been patented by teenagers), high school, rivers of booze, a stint in the Army, college & marriage. We have to endure his search for the fabled Temple Of Gold, helpless to save him the trouble. There is more tragedy than triumph, more sadness than laughter, more anger than understanding...in short, Raymond experiences Life. Reading this book, I felt the sense of powerlessness my own parents must have felt. You can only witness in silence as painful, life-altering decisions are made. Wisdom can only be found on the other side of mistakes and bad decesions...it cannot be taught. Raymond has to bludgeon his soul before he can mend it. Temple Of Gold is wonderully written. It is realistic and moving. If it lacks something in the eloquence department, it is because Raymond is telling the story...not Zock. I'm afraid I've lost the thread somewhere in this review...just read the book. You'll be very glad that you did. Teen-angst isn't usually this edible in literature.

I have never loved a book the way I love this one. As someone who previously reviewed it said, it is the reason I became a writer. I have never written a word or reflected on my own life without being influenced by it. My mother, who was good enough to give me her copy (which, of course, I've subsequently given away) always called it The Better Catcher in the Rye and I tend to agree. I give this book to anyone I really love.

I've read this book a couple of times - first when I was a senior in high school, again a couple of years into college, and then most recently as a first year grad student - and every time I've loved it. There are a lot of reasons(it's wry, sincere, frighented, hopefull, and terribly honest... not to mention beautifully written), but I think one of them is that as Goldman works his way through the complex weave of friendship, hope, love, fear, confusion, etc with which he fills this novel, amist it all he somehow manages to capture that rhythm by which life just goes on and on and up and down and you learn some lessons and other things leave you scarred but either way things just keep moving. It's a really difficult thing to accomplish in such a personal and straigtforward novel such as this, but when it is accomplished, it's wonderful.

That's just one stab at explaining one of many reasons that I loved this book, though. I recomend it wholeheartedly.

This book was required reading at my friend's all boys high school many years ago. He recommended it to me and it became one of four or five books from my teenage years that have stayed with me. Many people have compared it to Catcher in the Rye. I can see the resemblance, but this book is so much better. It may not be, technically, better than Catcher but it has great heart and if you ask me, it's just a much better story. I have heard William Goldman say terrible things about this book; maybe because it was his first book he sees all kinds of errors or things he would write differently now, but boy, I just love love love it.
I reread it this week for the first time in 10 years or so, and it was just as funny and fresh as it was the first time. I have teenage boys who are not readers and am going to start reading this to them at the dinner table. I think they might pick it up on their own after a few pages.

...to find that others feel as I do about this gem of a book. It was among hundreds of dusty, disintegrating old books my parents purchased at an auction when I was young, and even then it was well out of print, but its impact was huge: I read it countless times and will read it again. It contains some of the finest writing about youth and friendship I've ever read. Goldman went on to write a great many award-winning movies, but I think this was his greatest accomplishment -- and it was his first novel.

I have read a lot a books as a teenager but none have had the impact of this story. I have searched for high & low for a copy to be able to read it again. Vivid memories of Raymond's life changing episode always comes back to mind when I think about books I've read. Hopefully I will get another copy and once I read it, I will first have my husband read it, he never has had the opportunity. I will then LEND it to my grown sons and get their thoughts on it, then I will put it away for my grandson to read when he's older. I cannot wait to see if it leaves me with the same haunting memories, I have always wondered if I would feel the same way reading it today as I did all those years ago.

That line is on pg.97 of my copy. I was talking to buddy of mine who graduated from high school with be in '64 back in Indiana. He used that line last night but thought it was from Cathcer in the Rye. I dug out my 35 year-old copy, and found the exact reference for him. Talk about an influential book!!! That copy has moved with me from Indiana to California, Michigan, New York, back to Michigan and now down to Texas. It has been with me through 2 marriages, numerous jobs, and one race riot. It is a keeper. So is my old buddy.

I have read a lot a books as a teenager but none have had the impact of this story. I have searched for high & low for a copy to be able to read it again. Vivid memories of Raymond's life changing episode always comes back to mind when I think about books I've read. Hopefully I will get another copy and once I read it, I will first have my husband read it, he never has had the opportunity. I will then LEND it to my grown sons and get their thoughts on it, then I will put it away for my grandson to read when he's older. I cannot wait to see if it leaves me with the same haunting memories, I have always wondered if I would feel the same way reading it today as I did all those years ago.

That line is on pg.97 of my copy. I was talking to buddy of mine who graduated from high school with be in '64 back in Indiana. He used that line last night but thought it was from Cathcer in the Rye. I dug out my 35 year-old copy, and found the exact reference for him. Talk about an influential book!!! That copy has moved with me from Indiana to California, Michigan, New York, back to Michigan and now down to Texas. It has been with me through 2 marriages, numerous jobs, and one race riot. It is a keeper. So is my old buddy.

One of my all-time favorite books (Rates #2 right after "One Flew Over The Cuckoos Nest") and William Goldman's best. I discovered it when I was 15 and have read it a number of times since then, maybe even as many as ten, and I never tire of it. I quote it often: "What we are is either because of or in spite of our families, which amounts to the same in the end."

I believe this book should never go out of print. It should be shelved right next to Golding's "Lord of the Flies" (where you always find Goldman on the bookshelf) in the Classics section. Hemingway, Faulkner, Fitzgerald, and my man William Goldman.