I was appalled by that as well especially how no one was empathetic to her passing and still referred to her as that even at her empty funeral. So sad and truly awful.

I absolutely agree Steinbeck’s imagery is some of the absolute best. For me personally, I absolutely enjoyed what happened between Adam, Charles and Kathy. I wasn’t to invested in Aaron and Caleb. The book is very long so it took me awhile too.

I agree with you on pretty much everything, to a T. I replied to an earlier comment about the pacing and noted that I think I went into it with pacing bias since my wife told me it was slow in parts. Again, I don’t think by any measure it was awful - just kinda similar to the slow parts in 20,000 leagues under the sea.

Completely agree about the relevance of Joe. Like he felt somewhat insignificant to me… Regarding Cal, I align with you exactly. I initially disliked him and liked aaron then completely swapped. Kathy was also excellent.

Totally agree about the racist language. Being Asian and my wife also being of Chinese descent, the treatment of Lee by smaller side characters were pretty upsetting (the nurse at the end kinda turned my gears).

I totally get that. My wife was actually the one who recommended it to me with the cautionary “there are some slow parts, but just get through them” quote that is all too famous. I must’ve just gone in with some pacing bias.