Book Analysis A Scanner Darkly, written by Philip K. Dick in 1977, is a science fiction novel whose narrative serves as a commentary for the drug-saturated period that was the 1970’s, as seen by Dick himself. The story follows Bob Arctor, an undercover narcotics agent, who accidentally becomes hooked on a popular hallucinogenic while on […]

Book Analysis No Country for Old Men, a novel written by Cormac McCarthy in 2005, follows the events surrounding three central characters: Sheriff Bell, Anton Chigurh, and Llewelyn Moss. The story focuses on Moss as he attempts to escape his mortality at the hands of Anton Chigurh, a hitman hired to retrieve the large sum […]

Book Analysis Harvey Pekar’s series of comics titled American Splendor follow Pekar’s own life in Cleveland, Ohio. Subject matter can range from his job to his bouts with cancer but, for the most part, the focus is on the negative aspects of his life. Pekar utilizes these negative chronicles in his life to twist them […]

Book Analysis The Orchid Thief is a novel written by Susan Orlean that follows her real-life experiences with Mr. John LaRoche, an eccentric and very intelligent man whose passions often border on the obsessive. The book documents the arrest and subsequent trial of Mr. LaRoche in response to his involvement and orchestration in “orchid poaching” […]

Book Analysis Michael Cunningham’s book, The Hours, was a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel written in 1999 that surrounds the lives of three women as they struggle with the satisfaction (or lack thereof) that they feel about their lives. The three women, Virginia Woolf, Laura Brown, and Clarissa Vaughan are each shown to have deep regrets as […]

Analysis of the Book Pride and Prejudice, a novel written by English author Jane Austen in the early 1800’s, was a book that served as a sort of a satirical social commentary on a multitude of subjects. The plot surrounds the same period as the book’s own publishing and touches on subjects such as gender […]

Reading Analysis: Sherlock Holmes and the case of the Mazarin Stone is a short story that surrounds the exploits of the renowned detective as he dodges plots of murder while solving the case of a missing stone for a Lord Cantlemere. The dialogue within the story is very colorfully written with a dry wit that […]

1.      Book Analysis Laurence Sterne’s The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is an autobiography that surrounds Tristram in which he narrates segments of his own life as well as those surrounding him. Aside from Tristram himself, the novel follows the exploits of Uncle Toby, a veteran whose time is spent reenacting his adventures […]