Cloud Splitter

So I'm reading this book called Cloud Splitter, by Russell Baker. By the looks of it, it was written and published about the time that Don Delillo produced Underworld and Thomas Pynchon came out with Mason Dixon. For that matter, I think all three came out just after David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest. Infinite Jest is the longest of the four, but all three are long, clocking in at over 800 pags. Cloud Splitter is the shortest at just under 800 pages. It's like these three writers saw Infinite Jest and decided "Hey, let's all write really long books."

I've only read Underworld, which I liked a lot.

I picked up Cloud Splitter late into last summer. I picked up where I left off this week and probably won't finish it until after the Thanksgiving break.

It's about John Brown, told by his son Owen--the only Brown to survive the attack on Harper's Ferry just before the Civil War.

It's pretty good, though sometimes slow moving.

My only problem is that he makes a few changes in the actual story, which I know many writers do. One in particular involves the suicide of a key character who in real life lived to a ripe old age.