mattlb 's review for:

South and West: From a Notebook by Joan Didion

3.0

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The experience of reading these notes didn’t quite live up to my expectations after reading the introduction. Didion’s notes about California are only about 10 pages and felt like reading someone’s rough shorthand, but she writes about California constantly and the value in these vignettes are for her views as an outsider in the south. Didion’s travelogue about the south is enchanting in the sense that I felt vicariously hypnotized as I read about how the south seemed to sedate her senses. The writing is also often funny in Didion’s signature self deprecating and observational ways, and at times becomes a more personal memoir.