Title: Dry and Disappointing
Product review: I've read all of HJ's fiction, his Notebooks, Prefaces, Letters, travel writing and a shelf of biographies and I'm finding this book lifeless and "studied." It does not animate HJ, but makes him a waxwork--I found the (fairly) recent biography of HJ in relation to Fenimore and Minnie far livelier and better written. It's being hyped to the stars, but does not live up to the hype, and if you read the long NYTBR review carefully, the reviewer there isn't wild about it either, noting its mechanical quality and its anachronistic view of HJ.
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