Am I doing book reviews now?

I liked the movie Gone With the Wind and I've heard that the book it is based upon is one of the great American novels, so I put it on my "to read" list a while ago. I finally got around to reading it last month.

I like that the author made the heroine unlikeable. In fact, I believe if Ms. O'Hara had a thorough psychoanalysis she would be diagnosed as a sociopath. I think it takes a lot of skill as an author to create a character that readers may not particularity identify with or like, yet they still care about what happens to said character. I also liked that since this book spans several cities and decades, there is a growing cast of characters over time. Some characters fell off permanently during the course of the book, some made a reappearance when you had all but forgotten about them and new ones were popping up all the time. It bothers me immensely when a book is supposed to happen over many years, but you basically end the book with the same cast that you started with, plus or minus one or two major characters. To me it always seemed unrealistic and lazy on the part of the author. Ms. Mitchell is not afraid to let her cast of characters wax and wane and they all feel fully realized, with distinct personalities and motivations.

Now let me tell you what I didn't like about this book: it is racist. Undeniably racist. And I don't mean that there is racism in the book or there are racist slurs. Of course there is/are.  This books takes place in the south during the Civil War. How could be this book be anywhere near historically accurate if there wasn't any?  However, I think there's a big difference between a book with racism in it and a racist book. For a book to be racist I believe the author must be racist and from Ms. Mitchell's glorification of the Ku Klux Klan, to her comparisons of slaves to children and animals, I very much believe her to be racist. The narration itself was racist, not just the characters. This lead me to wonder how in the world this book ended up on so many "best American novels" lists. There is a strong love storyline and a lot of action in this book, so maybe people choose to just sweep the racism under the rug and remember it as a love story full of drama.

I actually re-watched the movie after I read the book because I didn't remember it being so bad, but it turns out a lot of the strongest racist plot-lines are left out or altered in the movie.

Oh, and I forgot to mention there is also a drunken scene with threatened domestic violence that looks like it's going to end up in marital rape, but the girl relaxes and ends up really enjoying it. What? Why, yes, this book was written by a woman.

I wouldn't say this was a bad book per se. It was well written. But if you want a romance with some drama, I'm sure you can find it elsewhere without all of the poor pitiful white southerners propaganda.

The End.