Sweet thursday blog (independent reading)

Before I start by summary of the first half of Sweet Thursday, by John Steinbeck, I want to inform the reader that I am a great fan of all literature by Steinbeck, including Cannery Row, The Grapes of Wrath, and Of Mice and Men. I like these books because they are for the universal audience, meaning that anyone, no matter their social stature or cultural background, can appreciate the simplicity of life in Monterrey. These books showed me that you don't need to have all kinds of literary complexity to make a great read. Steinbeck uses only the essential words to shape a scene, and by the time that I have read the first page, I cannot wait to read another.

Sweet Thursday is a book about the life of Doc, the resident scientist/biologist that works at Western Biological Laboratories, in Monterrey. He collects all kinds of oceanic life, and doesn't have many friends. Every evening, he goes over to the local grocery store, and buys a six-pack of beer. He doesn’t have any hobbies except for drinking, and sometimes, paying an expensive hooker to come into his apartment and listen to opera music. While his story is being told, another story of a lonely girl coming to Monterrey is taking place too. This new girl is kind of lost, and she is very mysterious. Her name is Suzy, and she comes into town to stay at the Bear Flag, the local prostitute house. At the house, we learn that Dora, the leader/caretaker of the establishment has a sister, and that sister, names Fauna starts an etiquette process that makes it possible for the prostitutes to get married easier because they will be able to be presentable to the future husbands and the future families.

The Boys that have lived in the Palace Flophouse with the help of Fauna want to arrange a date with Suzy and Doc because the Boys wrecked his Lab and want to make it up to him in the only means that they know of, women.

This is as far as I have gotten in the book, and there are a lot of specifics that I will cover in the next blog about the arranging of Doc and Suzy.(the idea, the plan, the events leading up to the arrangement)