Paul Kemp has moved from New York to the steamy heat of Puerto Rico to work at the Daily News. He starts hanging out at Al's Backyard, a local den selling booze and hamburgers to vagrant journalists who are mostly crazy drunks on the verge of quitting. Then he meets Yeamon, whose delectable girlfriend has Kemp stewing in his own lust. But the idle tension that builds up in places where men sweat twenty-four hours a day is reaching a violent breaking point.
Rum Diary
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"Disgusting as he usually was," Hunter Thompson writes in this, his 1959 novel, "on rare occasions he showed flashes of a stagnant intelligence. But his brain was so rotted with drink and dissolute living that whenever he put it to work it behaved like an old engine that had gone haywire from being dipped in lard." Surprise! Thompson isn't writing about himself, but one of the other, older, aimlessly carousing newspapermen in Puerto Rico, a guy called Moberg whose chief achievement is the ability to find his car after a night's drinking because it stinks so much. (I can smell it for blocks, he boasts.) The autobiographical hero, Paul Kemp, is 30, trapped in a dead-end job (Thompson wound up writing for a bowling magazine) and feeling as if his big-time writer dreams, soaked in F. Scott- Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway, are evaporating as rapidly as the rum in his fist.
In fact, Thompson was only 22 when he wrote The Rum Diary, but his fear of winding up like Moberg was well founded. What saved him was the fantastic conflagration of the 1960s, a fiery wind on which the reptilian wings of his prose style could catch and soar to the cackling heights of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Puerto Rico in 1959 doesn't have bad craziness enough to offer Thompson--just a routine drunken reporter stomping by local cops and a riot over Kemp's friend's temptress girlfriend, a scantily imagined Smith College alumna who likes to strip nude on beaches and in nightclubs to taunt men.
Thompson's prose style only intermittently takes tentative flight-- compare the stomping scenes in this book with his breakthrough, Hell's Angels --but it's interesting to see him so nakedly reveal his sensitive innards, before the celebrated clownish carapace grew in. It's also interesting to see how he improved this full version of the novel from the more raw (and racist) excerpts found in the 1990 collection Songs of the Doomed --Tim Appelo, Amazon.com --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Review
‘Crackling, twisted, searing, paced to a deft prose rhythm … a shot of Gonzo with a rum chaser’ -- San Francisco Chronicle
‘Hilarious, utterly real and tragic … A lithe, well-crafted gem of a novel which leaves the reader disturbed and grinning’ -- Scotland on Sunday
‘Remarkable - a genuine, 100% proof discovery of great literary importance’ -- Mail on Sunday
‘Wild, witty, angry, cynical and sarcastic … A funny book that will make your life seem boring by comparison’ -- Scene
‘Hilarious, utterly real and tragic … A lithe, well-crafted gem of a novel which leaves the reader disturbed and grinning’ -- Scotland on Sunday
‘Remarkable - a genuine, 100% proof discovery of great literary importance’ -- Mail on Sunday
‘Wild, witty, angry, cynical and sarcastic … A funny book that will make your life seem boring by comparison’ -- Scene
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful
By T. J. Cox
Format:Paperback
Hunter makes you feel in this short novel that you are the protagonist, and that it is you who is experiencing the craziness of Carribbean nights and parties, the rum, the fear, the uncertainty, the laissez-faire article writing, the beautiful girl. It is an adventure, and one worth having. If you are looking for escapism, this is it. If you are looking for quality writing, this is it. If you're looking for a good story, this is it.
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
For your next beach holiday, forget your suntan lotion + order this. There is enough sun, sand + Caribbean rum in this novel to keep you going through the winter.
You may have heard of Thompson's "FEAR & LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS" which was made into a film with Johnny Depp + Benicio Del Toro in 1998. This, Thompson's first novel, bares some similarities, although the drug intake is a little tamer + the general feel of the book is a little more laidback.
It chronicles the drunken antics of budding journalist Paul Kemp during the late 50s in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Kemp is a thinly disguised Thompson, (the novel being very close to autobiographical), who starts work for the San Juan Daily News, a paper which is constantly on the brink of bankruptcy due to its corrupt, degenerate + drug addled staff.
It is because of the town's gradual intake of American greedmongers + social misfits that there is a growing sense of unrest among the locals who have begun to want the paper + its staff off the island.
To add to this cocktail are the sultriest, most maddening charms to appear on a written page, in the shape of hard-partying but tragic blonde Chenault, the girlfriend of one of Kemp's colleagues. The summer heat + mounting tension become more enveloping + intense with every turn of the page, masterfully turning Kemp's copious consumption of rum into a thoroughly riveting read..
You may have heard of Thompson's "FEAR & LOATHING IN LAS VEGAS" which was made into a film with Johnny Depp + Benicio Del Toro in 1998. This, Thompson's first novel, bares some similarities, although the drug intake is a little tamer + the general feel of the book is a little more laidback.
It chronicles the drunken antics of budding journalist Paul Kemp during the late 50s in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Kemp is a thinly disguised Thompson, (the novel being very close to autobiographical), who starts work for the San Juan Daily News, a paper which is constantly on the brink of bankruptcy due to its corrupt, degenerate + drug addled staff.
It is because of the town's gradual intake of American greedmongers + social misfits that there is a growing sense of unrest among the locals who have begun to want the paper + its staff off the island.
To add to this cocktail are the sultriest, most maddening charms to appear on a written page, in the shape of hard-partying but tragic blonde Chenault, the girlfriend of one of Kemp's colleagues. The summer heat + mounting tension become more enveloping + intense with every turn of the page, masterfully turning Kemp's copious consumption of rum into a thoroughly riveting read..
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
This novel was written by Thompson in 1959, when he was only 22 and was probably yet to put the words "fear" and "loathing" into a sentence together. Only recently was the manuscript found and published, and well worth the 40 year wait it is, this is the great Hunter S. showing very definite early signs of his full potential and brilliance. Paul Kemp is how Thompson saw himself in 10 years time; drinking heavily and sweating a lot in some hot foreign paradise. He first arrives in Puerto rico after an alcohol fueled wrestling match on a plane with an old man who obstructs his view of a young blonde he has his eye on, and the first thing his new employer does is to ask him if he is a pervert, telling him that one more pervert at the newspaper would be the last straw. you can almost hear Kemp asking himself what the hell he is doing here amidst his laid back commentary. Along the way he befriends a terminal cynic, a mad bisexual, and a massive violent nut, who enjoys twisting heads...and these are just his fellow journalists. Thompson here lays out exactly how hard it is to survive and make a healthy living in a place like Puerto Rico, and all through a cloud of rum. Sheer Brilliance
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Rum Punch ...
My favourite authors are always the ones who can vary their writing styles, and you can't predict
where their plots, structures and viewpoints/storylines are going. Hunter S. Read more
where their plots, structures and viewpoints/storylines are going. Hunter S. Read more
Published 1 month ago by The Brixtonian
5.0 out of 5 stars
brilliant book
i read fear and loathing in las vegas before i read this. thompson's style of writing really appeals to me.
Published 2 months ago by hillel
5.0 out of 5 stars
A true classic
I started with 'fear and loathing in Las Vegas', a natural starting point given the film of the same name. Read more
Published 3 months ago by Simon
5.0 out of 5 stars
The rum diary book
We bought this book to go with the DVD for our son, the book was as described, overall an excellent service
Published 4 months ago by b wats
2.0 out of 5 stars
Slow and long
Though I enjoyed it,I found it dragged on too long and it was too slow.
It is typical Hunter S,Thompson so if you like his style then you will like this book.
It is typical Hunter S,Thompson so if you like his style then you will like this book.
Published 5 months ago by Kayrose
5.0 out of 5 stars
The deadly ticking of a thousand hungry clocks
Written when the author was little more than twenty and based on personal experience, this is the tale of Paul Kemp, cynical, hard-drinking journalist who takes up a post on the... Read more
Published 8 months ago by Antenna
4.0 out of 5 stars
The creating of Hunter S Thompson
This book gives you an insight into why Hunter S Thompson has managed to write other books like Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas. Read more
Published 8 months ago by matt
4.0 out of 5 stars
A dark concoction of rum drinking and rum goings on
The Rum Diary is a darkly comic snapshot of a booze-fuelled hack's time spent working for a Puerto Rican newspaper. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Bill
2.0 out of 5 stars
Just passing time
If you've read Fear and Loathing and liked it, re-read it. There is nothing new in this book, it's just a process of turning pages and having no surprises (only good bit was "you... Read more
Published 13 months ago by Ms Sheila A. Fleming
3.0 out of 5 stars
Thompson at the start of his career...
This is a fairly interesting book by HST; his first and only novel. Of secondary importance to the rest of his books though, and has only hints of the explosive, savagely funny... Read more
Published 15 months ago by F Drew
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