No. 35 - Roughing It

by Mark Twain

Started: July 5
Finished: August 21

Notes: I've read a fair amount of Twain, but it seems like there's always more to read. It's been a while since I've read any of his works, so I thought I'd settle into this one, especially since this year I've been trying to catch up on some classics that have eluded me thus far. "Roughing It" is sort of an autobiography, Twain's comments on 6 or 7 years he spent out West and in Hawaii, but with Twain you can't always tell where the truth ends and fiction begins. Not that I have a problem with that.

Mini review: This is another book I'm glad to have read but I'm also glad to be done with it. True to what I expected, this is a travelogue of Twain's trip to Utah, Nevad, California and Hawaii. The first half of the book I found entertaining, full of tall tales and humorous anecdotes Twain picked up in his travels, but the second helf felt bogged down to me mainly because the tone of the writing switches to more descriptive text of what Twain saw in Hawaii and elsewhere. The book ends well, however, with the last 20 or so pages giving a brief partial history of Mormonism and including a rambling, though humorous newspaper article.