Hello and welcome to a new review! Today I will be telling you what I thought about a book I've been reading for a while now. Ernest Hemingway's "True at First Light" is his final novel and I believe a semi fictional memoir.
Let's begin with the cover. My edition has the African plains during a sunset as the cover. Seeing as how this book was set in Africa, I see no better cover to be chosen to attract a potential reader's eye. It's very warm, very inviting, and is basically just demanding to be read. Especially since the title and author fonts are quite big. Even the small description of the book and the notice about the introduction written by Patrick Hemingway. But that's all there is to it.
Now on to the storyline. I personally feel there isn't one. It's just Hemingway telling us about what happened during that particular time he spent in Africa with his wife at the time, Mary. I would've stopped reading the book somewhere down the middle when I realized there wasn't going to be much of an exciting element to the book, or any sort of emotional element for that matter, but as some of you know sometimes books or movies that may seem boring like to end with a grand finale or something that makes you stop and think about the ending and I was hoping to get that from this book. Sadly, there was no such ending. All that happened was that Ernest went back to sleep. The events happening in the book are completely ordinary and everyday for a life in an African reserve and living as a game ranger. He describes every hunt for meat and every kill for maintaining order in the reserve, every breakfast he has with Mary, every night they go to bed, everything that happens every day with too much detail. And that's the basis of the story. You'd think with him adding a fictional element to this memoir that he would make it a little bit more interesting. Unfortunately, that was not the case.
As for the writing style, I will not deny that Ernest Hemingway has an excellent command of the English language and uses a very wide range of vocabulary to describe these everyday events. However, how many times does one have to narrate in detail breakfast with one's wife, hunting the same game for meat, and going to bed, etc? Even if I manage to write about me waking up in the morning like it's poetry, it is still just me waking up in the morning. Ernest Hemingway uses this skill of great detail very effectively in his poetry, but this sort of backfired on him in writing this book.
And finally, the characters. The main characters are, of course, Ernest and Mary Hemingway. Ernest I thought was a very confusing character. From the way he portrayed himself in the book, I couldn't exactly connect to his character like I do in other books. It's not like I wanted Hemingway to make himself into the best man ever, but at the same time he wasn't a bad guy. I can't describe very well, but I would say that Hemingway, in this book, is nonchalant, stubborn, kind, firm, and complicated, as he described his life in the book. I think his life was complicated only because he is too. Mary was portrayed as a very loving wife. She is very soft, kind, understanding, but sometimes she does get a bit fed up and let's Ernest know that. Still, in the nicest way possible. Her conversations with Ernest are usually about how she wants him to love her always and that she sometimes debates with him about certain thoughts and habits of theirs. All in all, she's just a really nice person. The side characters aren't ones that have much influence on the events. They're just present when something happens. They are all mostly the employees of the Hemingway's who work with Ernest to keep the reserve under control and handling every day matters. Others are Debba, who is an African young woman in love with Ernest and is considered by everyone to be his fiancee (including Mary) and all she ever does when she comes into the picture is admire Ernest's gun holster and say "No hay remedio"; the Informer who works with the local law enforcement and the rangers and informs Ernest about anything he believes he needs to know along with messages; G.C. who is a ranger on another reserve and is very dear to the Hemingway's almost like a son to them; Mr. Singh who runs a shop in a town called Laitokitok and enjoys drinking various alcoholic drinks with Ernest and has a very beautiful wife; and Pop who is the previous head ranger before Ernest and who taught him everything he needs to know about handling the reserve and was like a father to Ernest. There were other names briefly mentioned but they were either people Ernest was recalling in memories and flashbacks or people on the reserve he would interact with briefly.
To sum up a long and quite boring story, this book is not recommended by me. I was never one to really like memoirs, but I thought "True At First Light" would be worth the read since it was written by one of the most renowned authors and poets and was named his final novel. As a whole I would rate this book a 3 out of 10 because I liked the use of vocabulary and description and that it actually kept me reading it because I wanted to know if there was a point to the memoir.
Well that was it for today! Sorry to have to bring you a bad review this time but this book has been the only one I've been reading and as of late I haven't watched/read anything good. But I will start reading a new book that I've been very excited to read and will write a review as soon as possible.
Thank you for reading and please leave any comments on the website or on the facebook page or any of myother social media links, share and like, and I will see you next Thursday! Hue Mann, over and out!! ;)