I discovered James Dean as a teenager and became enchanted by him, and watched the three movies he starred in multiple times. I haven't watched "East of Eden" or "Rebel without a Cause" in years, but I have watched "Giant", because, well, Texas :) And Elizabeth Taylor, and Rock Hudson, and oil barons and yeah. As a kid, that's what I thought Texas was like--sprawling mansions on million acre ranches, cowboys, oil derricks. Don Graham's book was lots of fun and talked about the five major players of the film: Taylor, Hudson, and Dean along with director George Stevens and book author Edna Ferber. The lion's portion of the book was devoted to James Dean, which seems fair, since he stole the movie (through his acting and managing to get himself killed before it was finished). He discussed the importance of the movie today, how its legacy has endured. Now I really want to rewatch "Giant", but alas, I have too many books to read at the moment!
I was super disappointed with Joyce Carol Oates' latest collection of short stories, "Beautiful Days". Partially my fault: I got most of the way through then, then had a ton of other books I had to read, discovered "The Crown" on Netflix, and got distracted so I kept renewing it. It took me nine weeks to finish it, by which time I just didn't care anymore. Sad to say, I can't really remember any of the earlier stories, they just didn't stick with me, and the ones I just read were pretty dull.
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