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ben_r's review against another edition
5.0
I'll give almost any book written about Camus 4 stars. Almost is the key word. Kaplan's book gets the full five. "The Stranger" is both a strange book and a masterpiece. It's inner working, as explained by Kaplan, are worth important consideration.
michellehogmire's review
4.0
What do James M. Cain's American crime novel The Postman Always Rings Twice and the French comedy film Le Schpountz have in common? They, along with investigative reporting experience and a hatred of executions, were both early influences on Camus' The Stranger. In this entertaining book bio, Alice Kaplan traces the history of Camus' novel in conjunction with his complicated life--from the difficulty of transporting his manuscript across the occupied zone during WWII to his begrudging acceptance of the title "existentialist" in New York (despite his stark divergence from Sartre's philosophy). Although Kaplan's work drags a bit in its excessive recounting of both the publishing process and the early critical reception of The Stranger, the book ends beautifully; through her research, the author uncovers the true story on which Camus' famous murder on the beach is based, finally giving a name to the nameless Arab who has been a stranger for so long: Kaddour Touil.
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