The Bonfire of the Vanities

I remember all of the people and flights well from my youth. The insights the author provides are eye opening, but make sense in retrospect. I'm just not a fan of his writing style. I get the sense that he, as the story teller, considers himself a part of the story. He is not. Sorry Tom, not a fan.

I've owned "The Right Stuff" for over thirty years in print form. I downloaded the Kindle version from the store to take with me on business trips.

To my disgust, the Kindle edition is abysmal - clearly, the store or whoever came up with it ran the print edition through a character-recognition software program and utterly failed to copy-edit it afterwards. The number of errors is alarming, and it is only because I've read the print version so many times that I was able to recognize what some of the errors meant in the text.

It's a shame, because this book is a fine, fine book and one of my all-time favorites. Shame on the store or the publisher or both for charging $10.00 for a flawed, poorly-edited copy.

It's just me. It's not a bad book, or written poorly. It's a classic. Though I grew up on the 'old' classics, I just can't get through this. This is my second attempt to read it in 10 years. To me, it's very much like Emily Brontë in downtown New York City..... I've failed as a literate reader of great works! After 60 years, I'd prefer something that moves along and tells a story like Stuart Woods does rather than Bronte, and Wolfe, who wants to describe every blade of grass or split in the concrete before getting to the point.

A satire or Wall Street--but don't expect an Oliver Stone style finger pointing session. Wolfe's main criticism of Wall Street actually seems less about their greed and wealth but more about the entirely artificial parallel universe they create in order to generate their wealth. There's a great scene in which Sherman attempts to explain to his 7 year old daughter what he does for a living and comes up empty. The implication isn't that 7 year olds are simpleminded but rather that if you can't explain your job to a 7 year old, are you really doing anything at all?

But Wall Street isn't the only target. Yellow journalism (and "real" journalism which follows the lead of the tabloids in the book's great epilogue), big city politics, law enforcement, socialites, civil rights activists........they are all unmasked as shallow and self serving. Wolfe is sometimes called a conservative but I'm not sure if that's even quite true. It's just that his satirical pen is aimed at almost everyone across the political and social spectrum and that offends liberal sensibilities.

Wolfe is often very funny but he's definitely an overdescriber. Though not as bad as David Foster Wallace--who takes overdescribing to its absolute outer limits in many parts of Infinite Jest.

Shame on the publisher (Picador/Farrar, Straus and Giroux) for the sloppy production of this ebook. The Right Stuff To care so little about the quality of their product is an insult to both the author and his readers. Don't buy the ebook version until the publisher makes it right.
The original book, as written by Tom Wolfe, deserves 5 stars. It's highly entertaining as well as informative. In this review, I'm only rating the quality of the ebook which has at least five dozen scanning errors, some of which are confusing and make it impossible to figure out what the author intended. Until the publisher fixes it, spend your money on something else. There's plenty of quality ebooks available.

For many years The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe's satirical novel about race and money in New York City, has been called the definitive novel of the 1980s. It was a smash hit upon publication in 1987 and earned Wolfe, already known for his nonfiction books The Right Stuff and The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, raves. But is it a garbage novel?

The first mark against Bonfire is that it purports to show how problematic race relations were in New York City in the 1980s, yet it has no characters of color. Reverend Bacon, a corrupt spin on an Al Sharpton/Jesse Jackson-type character, is the closest the novel comes to having a black character and he's barely in it at all. Instead, Bonfire treats African Americans like dangerous "others," viewing them only through the prism of what its white characters think. That they don't think anything good is part of the satire but I can't help thinking that it's extremely problematic not to allow them representation. This is exacerbated if you listen to the audio, as I did, because the only black voices you hear are performed as guttural growls.

To be fair to the audio, stereotyping by voice is actually common in this book. If your attention lapsed for a second, you could instantly figure out who was in the scene just by listening to the voices used. If you heard the narrator's normal voice or a bad parody of a Yale accent, you were in the main storyline about Sherman McCoy, a bond trader who fancies himself a "Master of the Universe" until a joyride with his mistress ends in a hit and run in the Bronx. If everyone sounds like a wise guy--a bad parody of The Godfather--the cops or DA had taken center stage. And if you heard a bad parody of a British Downton Abbey-esque accent, it was the journalists. I probably wouldn't have noticed how the characters were so forcefully grouped--and how similar the people within those groups are--without the audiobook's narrator clueing me into it.

Mixed throughout the upper-class characters are a range of southerners. I lived in New York for many years and never heard as many heavy southern accents as Tom Wolfe appears to believe exist there, and it's hard to tell if this is his way of inserting himself into the story or not.

Wolfe does have some smart, acidic observations sprinkled throughout. Part of me feels bad calling this book problematic because the ways in which it's problematic weren't commonly recognized until more recently. Bonfire of the Vanities was published in 1987 when it was common to filter the experience of others through at least one white character. Driving Miss Daisy, a movie about an old white lady (slowly) learning to respect her black driver as a human being, famously beat Do the Right Thing, a fiery exploration of race and anger made by a black man and starring mostly black people, for Best Picture at the Oscars in 1989. A year later that prize went to Dances With Wolves, a movie about white Kevin Costner trying to save Indians.

But does not knowing better at the time excuse problematic representation? Consider that women are more visible than African Americans in this novel but aside from a treatise on how women are disrespected as they age, they are just as unknown and unexplored. The only female character who can claim to have a significant role is the ultimate gold-digger.

If you are rolling your eyes because I'm wringing my hands about representation in a satire, calm down and consider that this satire is alarmingly poorly written. First of all, it's much longer than it has to be. I could go through and remove entire scenes from this book and the plot wouldn't suffer at all. The first third in particular indulgently refuses to get to any point. Then there are numerous plot holes and infuriating pieces of plotting that only happen to move the plot where Wolfe wants it to go. For example, when McCoy is finally arrested the police know perfectly well that a woman was in the car with him, yet they don't ask him a single question about who she was--and he doesn't volunteer any information.

This is meant to be part of the satire: the police and the DA only care about the case because the black citizens of the Bronx are publicly forcing them to care. Having Sherman in custody is a token gesture to shut them up. As for Sherman, the entire book is meant to laugh at him because he thinks he's a Master of the Universe but he has absolutely no skills in the real world. He can't even explain to his daughter what he does for a living. But how is it possible that only gossip columnists care about the identity of the mystery woman? And once her identity is revealed in the newspaper, she disappears out of the country and the only person who notices is Sherman--because he's the only person trying to talk to her.

When she does come back to the US the DA finally decides they should talk to her, but only to force her to corroborate the case they are building in court. This, again, is meant to be part of the satire, but here's the infuriating plot hole (spoilers ahead): Sherman goes to visit her wearing a wire to get her to confess that she was driving the car. Being inept at life, he fails, but she tells him that the DA is trying to force her to lie on the stand. And he gets it ON TAPE. Both Sherman and his lawyer treat this episode like a total failure since they couldn't get her to admit to driving the car, completely oblivious to the bombshell they have. Had I been holding a physical copy of the book instead of listening to the audio, I might have thrown it across the room in exasperation. The trial continues for another hundred pages (until Sherman is at his most dire moment plotwise) before his lawyer trots out the audio for the judge as a surprise "get out of jail free" card. Why would he sit on this information for a hundred pages? When did he realize what he had on his hands? It doesn't matter because delaying the reveal makes for a more satisfying courtroom climax. (end spoilers)

You may be rolling your eyes because I'm worried about plotting in a satire, but pick up Jonathan Swift sometime and see how wonderfully well-written satire can be. Yes, it requires great leaps in logic, but deliberately clumsy writing is not a must. Then consider the poor plotting and editing and layer it on top of the problematic representation. While Bonfire of the Vanities has its strengths, it's far from a great book and it hasn't aged well at all. I wouldn't say it's bad enough to be called garbage but I also wouldn't argue if someone else did.

You can find more of my reviews on SupposedlyFun.com

This is a 1987 novel about life in New York among various social groups. At times the book is hilarious. At other times the book is sad and poignant. The author made me like some characters, dislike others, and genuinely care about and fear for the welfare of some. The writing was effective in that context.

According to my studies, after reading the novel, the author did a lot of research about the financial industry, political groups, police officers, the courts, etc... As a retired police officer, I felt some of the writing was so seemingly realistic, I was wondering if the author had spent time as a police officer. I have also observed prosecutors act in ways consistent with parts of this story. I am referring to the selection of a female juror based on appearance by a male prosecutor. Should one choose to read this novel, when one gets to that point, you will know what I mean. I have seen that occur.

At the same time, it seemed to me that there was a criminal prosecution contemplated using witnesses did not appear to be telling the truth. That is outside of my personal experience. If I felt that a witness was not being truthful, I would not use him unless and until my doubts were resolved. Obviously that can get complicated. I also have no doubt that at some point that has occurred. I am just stating that I know for sure that many police officers and prosecutors will not do that.

I agree with another reviewer in that I was disappointed with the ending. I have been told that ending a novel is very difficult. The story was very good until then.

I read this book from a paperback while simultaneously listening to the audiobook narrated by Joe Barrett. Mister Barrett's performance was excellent and really added to my enjoyment of this fine novel.

In summary, I enjoyed this novel very much. Also the audiobook narrated by Joe Barrett was excellent. This novel has made my short list of personal favorites. Thank You...

The Bonfire of the Vanities is a 1987 novel by Tom Wolfe. The story is a drama about ambition, xenophobia, social class, politics, and self-indulgence in 1980s New York City. The narrative centres on three main characters: WASP bond trader Sherman McCoy, self-regarded "Master of The Universe", Jewish ADA (assistant district attorney) Larry Kramer, and British expat journalist Peter Fallow. The narrative begins thus, Sherman McCoy mistress runs over a young teen, as they accidentally enter the Bronx at night, while they are driving to Manhattan. As a Wall Street highflier, McCoy sees his life unravel in the spotlight, and attracting the interest of a down and out reporter.

It is interesting to note that the historical event named “Bonfire of the Vanities”, Florence, Italy, related to the burning of objects judged by the established order as occasions of sin. The focus of this destruction was ostensibly on objects that might tempt one to sin, including vanity items such as mirrors, cosmetics, fine dresses, playing cards, and even musical instruments.

Wolfe revels in the boisterous, simmering world of 80s New York City, brings to life the colours, textures of a city troubled with racial tensions, and submerged in ego. The author shows a newly resurgent Wall Street of the 1980s​, a previous decade that had been bad for stocks. The excesses of Wall Street are brought to the fore. As the divergent worlds of McCoy and his victim, Henry is​ about to collide.

Horrifying and hilarious at the same time, this book is prophetic and even more relevant today than when it was first written. "The Bonfire of the Vanities" documents the decline of the WASP (white Anglo-Saxon Protestant) Establishment and the corresponding rise of Jewish power in America through its account of the merciless legal, financial, and moral destruction of a Wall Street bond trader.Wolfe's characterizations are flawless and he keeps the pace going. In fact, it is very difficult to put this book down once you start reading it. Should resonate with anyone who is alive and awake in this day of political correctness, opportunistically heightened sensitivities. and racial, gender, and class conflict -- the antecedents of which are amply and cynically detailed in Wolfe's novel. Wolfe more than deserves a place in the pantheon of great American writers, humorists, and social commentators, rubbing elbows with the likes of Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and H.L. Mencken. "Bonfire of the Vanities" is his masterpiece. Equally worth reading are his "The Right Stuff," "Radical Chic," and "The Painted Word. Wolfe spares no one! I do have to add that "Bonfire" does not have a satisfying ending. But that doesn't matter -- it's a roller coaster ride worth taking. And there probably are no happy endings to such stories as this one.

I picked up this book after reading it was THE classic novel capturing the zeitgeist of the 80s but its themes of wretched excess and racial and class tensions in New York City seem just as relevant today, although the tragedy at the heart of the book (bond trader Sherman McCoy being goaded into leaving the scene of a hit-and-run by his mistress Maria Ruskin) probably wouldn't occur today since GPS would have guided them safely back out of the Bronx into Manhattan.

I know Wolfe was inspired by the great 19th century novels of Dickens and Thackeray and this book's epic sweep from the housing projects of the Bronx to Park Avenue penthouses is impressive. You can tell Wolfe really did his homework and the thought processes of the lawyers and bond traders just 'feel' spot-on, based on my conversations with people who do inhabit those worlds.

I know some readers have complained that the characters aren't likeable but after a certain point it's hard not to sympathize with Sherman McCoy, a man who is caught in a web of politics not of his own making and who is, despite all of his initial arrogance, more sinned against than sinning. Of course, he lives a life of decadence "hemorrhaging money" but it doesn't seem to give him that much pleasure and his belief that his ability to push paper and make money on Wall Street gives him power anywhere else is a lie. At the end of the book, McCoy's life is destroyed but the lives of the poor and the oppressed in the city haven't changed at all, his trial is just a symbolic distraction and a media circus.

That said, the fact that McCoy is sympathetic has much to do with the fact that this book is very definitely told through the perspective of the haves versus the have-nots. The African-American characters tend to be portrayed as either saintly (like the mother of the victim) or as corrupt like the Reverend Bacon who uses McCoy's case to hide his own shady dealings. Of course many of the white characters are two-dimensional as well and McCoy's mistress is particularly repugnant. But like Dickens, Wolfe makes his caricatures (even Maria) very, very funny and he tells a great story.

There are some passages that probably should have been edited out (such as when minor characters pontificate for pages and pages without moving the plot along). But overall this is is one of those rare books that reads like a detective novel but is as thought-provoking as nonfiction.

A perfect fiction. Literary. Philosophical. Countless social messages but none being direct. Psychologically poignant. Cracker setups leading to interactions that give rise to an intricate satire of a different kind every few pages. All bad characters, still vastly different and with real life like nuances. And a great story.

This is a book that will certainly last centuries. Some may read it to understand the Wall Street excesses, but that is perhaps one of its smallest achievements. The book exposes many insecurities and sentiments of our era's racists and misogynists, infidel husbands and wives, pathologically fantasizing men, ambitious politicians, clergies driven by things unholy, trophy wives and socialites, journalists creating stories and mobs feeding them, criminals and thugs, professionals of all sorts - cops, lawyers, real estate agents and of course traders - resorting to the unethical if not the outright illegal.

And as these flawed characters cross swords in/on/at courts, prisons, soirees, restaurants, bedrooms, trading floors, streets, funerals, beaches and other divergent backdrops, crazy things keep happening amid superficially comical/satirical but marvelously subtle discussions about their behaviour and thinking. Sheer ridiculousness of the events - the accident post a wrong turn, the wrong number that revealed an affair, the restaurant death, the secret-spoiling hug, the newspaper on the floor, the chair-breaking debt collector - that propel the story make them entirely humane and credible.

There are wonderful descriptions about the life in the '80s that are going to prove fascinating for anyone of later generations. Apart from all the things discussed above, the book seems to find enough time to muse on the technology called conference call, the "Irishness" of the force, wire-tapping methods of the era and their legality, solitary and depressing life of a struggling immigrant/underpaid, thoughts of a sexually frustrated young father, the penury of a financially stretched millionaire and lifestyles of a gold-digger. It is simply astonishing to read how a master of the house could be ashamed or afraid of house helpers, a millionaire being intimidated by people both far more successful at parties and far less in prisons, DAs being taunted by criminals, judges jostled by attorneys or cops feeling like the minnows in plush houses.

A classic.

Henry Lamb, a black teenager living in a poor area of the Bronx, is seriously injured when he is hit by a car belonging to Sherman McCoy, a wealthy and successful Wall Street bond trader. The incident is reported in a tabloid newspaper, the case is taken up by the Revd. Reggie Bacon, a leading black activist, and the local District Attorney comes under political pressure to take action. The novel follows the course of the subsequent investigation and court proceedings.

“The Bonfire of the Vanities” was first published in 1987, at the height of the “Reagan boom”; Oliver Stone's film “Wall Street”, which gave us the phrase “greed is good”, came out in the same year. The 1980s were good years for the financial services industry and for the wealthy inhabitants of New York City, the centre of that industry in America. The stock market, which had been depressed for much of the previous decade, started booming again, but even more money was to be made in bonds than in stocks and shares. McCoy may be a fictional character, but he symbolises many real-life New Yorkers who made fortunes during this period. The less affluent parts of the city, however, remained run down, poverty-stricken and crime-ridden.

Tom Wolfe is often regarded as a politically conservative social commentator, but that does not mean that the forces of capitalism are exempt from his satire. He was no more capable of giving his assent to the proposition that “greed is good” than the politically more liberal Stone. Sherman McCoy is by no means an attractive character, and his most unattractive characteristics are his greed for money and his arrogance and sense of entitlement. He describes himself, without irony, as a “Master of the Universe”, a phrase Wolfe borrowed from a then-popular children’s cartoon series. He earns around $1,000,000 a year, a much greater sum in 1987 than it would be today, but regards that amount as insufficient to keep him in the style to which he would like to become accustomed. He holds poor people, especially poor black people, in contempt, and never gives a thought to the young man who has been injured by his car. He does not even bother reporting the incident to the police because he his mistress, Maria, was in the car with him and he does not want their relationship revealed either to his wife or to her husband. He has taken a mistress not because he is seriously dissatisfied with his attractive, intelligent and talented wife Judy but because he feels that the right to be unfaithful is one of the privileges attendant on being a Master of the Universe.

And yet, in his depiction of Sherman’s fall from grace in the second half of the story, Wolfe is still able to elicit sympathy for his anti-hero. The American Pledge of Allegiance talks about “liberty and justice for all”, and if this phrase means anything it must mean “liberty and justice for those people we dislike, even for unpleasant Wall Street financiers”. And what happens to Sherman is not justice. The evidence against him is deeply tainted by perjury and all those involved in his downfall, except the police officers investigating the case, get involved for selfish reasons. Peter Fallow, the hard-drinking British journalist who breaks the story does so not out of social concerns- in private he can be as scathing about poor black people as Sherman- but because he needs a major scoop to keep his editor happy. The demagogic Bacon turns the case into a cause celebre in order to further his political career and to consolidate his position as a self-appointed spokesman for the black community. The District Attorney decides to prosecute because he needs the support of that community if he is to be re-elected. Larry Kramer, the assistant DA prosecuting the case, is motivated partly by careerism and partly by the desire to impress the young woman he is hoping to seduce. (Like Sherman, Kramer is married but does not let this inconvenient fact hinder his career as a Don Juan).

Wolfe’s view of American justice, in fact, seems as cynical as his view of corporate finance and, again, his is not the traditional conservative “law and order” viewpoint. He takes the old maxim “a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged” and inverts it: “a liberal is a conservative who has been arrested”. The point of making his protagonist a rich white bond trader was, I think, precisely to emphasise the shortcomings of the criminal justice system. If a wealthy, powerful, privileged WASP aristocrat cannot expect justice, what hope would there be for a poor young black man?

Wolfe's ambition was to write a grand “state of the nation” social-realist novel in the traditional manner, doing for 20th century America what writers like Charles Dickens and William Thackeray had done for 19th century England. His title “The Bonfire of the Vanities” has a double significance. On the one hand it is a play on the title of Thackeray’s “Vanity Fair” which served as one of his models. On the other it is a reference to a historical event which happened in Florence in 1497 when Savonarola, effectively the theocratic dictator of the city, ordered the burning of objects that he considered sinful. Something similar happens to Sherman as he experiences a metaphorical, if not literal, bonfire of the vanities. As a “Master of the Universe” he defines his social standing in terms of his expensive material possessions- his $3,000,000 Park Lane apartment, his $36,000 Mercedes sports car, his handmade English suits and so on- and the story of his downfall is partly the story of the way in which these “vanities” are stripped from him one by one.

The main plot is a fairly simple one, but this is a wide-ranging novel, full of incident and with a large cast of characters drawn from many different sections of New York society and several different ethnic groups. Wolfe’s great strengths are his powers of observation and his ability to write about what he observes in an entertaining way, taking particular note of his characters foibles of speech, dress and behaviour. Some of the chapters, such as the one entitled “Death New York Style”, would make satisfying short stories in their own right. When John Updike, who did not like the book, described it as mere “journalism”, Wolfe (who of course began his career as a journalist) took this as a compliment. “The Bonfire of the Vanities” can be seen as the Great American Novel of the eighties.

I finally got around to watching The Right Stuff movie a few months ago, and I enjoyed it so much I wanted to know more about the original Mercury 7 and their times. I fell down the Wikipedia rabbit hole for a few weeks, learning all about Glenn and Grissom and the gang, but eventually I decided to go ahead and turn to the original source. Believe it or not, The Right Stuff was the very first Tom Wolfe book I ever read and I enjoyed every word of it. This book is funny, informative, philosophical, and full of surprises, and Wolfe does an excellent job of introducing us to the astronauts and their wives. I finished The Right Stuff with a fuller picture of the Mercury 7, and I feel like I truly understand the men who volunteered to sit on top of the rockets. I also got a spot on introduction to the USA government in the 1950s and 1960s that you can't get in most historical studies of the time period. I just all around enjoyed this book and will be heading over to the Smithsonian to check out Friendship 7 sometime soon.

The Right Stuff is a non-fiction account of the origin of the United States space program and the space race against the Soviet Union. It starts in the 1940s and goes up through the Mercury project. This book is chock-full of detailed information about airplanes and spacecraft. A lot of it went over my head – I found myself drifting off when listening to those parts. However, I was still able to grasp the timeline of events and the broad strokes of what was happening. I was hoping there would be more about the personal lives about the various astronauts, especially the stars like John Glenn and Alan Shepard.

The Right Stuff is narrated by Dennis Quaid. His tone is very man’s man – perfect for the way this book is written. However, he needs to work on his accents! Luckily, he didn’t need to use one very often.

I think this book would appeal to techies who are looking for detailed information about the rise of the space program up through our first orbital launch. Unfortunately, that person is not me.

Life is too short to read poorly-written, non-engaging books. I do not know why this book is rated so well. I am a lover of books, have read hundreds, and was an English major for my masters. The origin of the space program is a great subject for a book (surely the reason for this book's success), and I am even a fan of technical detail books (Moby Dick, The Perfect Storm), but this book frustrated me in not tapping into what was a great potential and subject matter (and great characters). I quit half way through; it was not worth it to me to read any further.

Wolfe does some things extremely well, not the least of which is to write a narrative that engages the reader. He is extremely funny, though usually at the expense of his characters. He has a very good eye for the status consciousness of Americans and their insecurities.

Real humor -- real laugh-out-loud stuff -- usually has a mean-spirited dimension. Wolfe's humor is no exception to this rule. Some of this meanness is for a good cause. The racial politics of the Sharpton-like "Reverend Bacon" character is very ugly and worthy of the merciless lampooning that Wolfe does so effectively. But, there are no sympathetic Black characters who can shed light on just what grievances underlie Bacon's appeal. And Wolfe doesn't seem to like women very much and has no sympathetic female character.

While there is some development in the Sherman McCoy character who has the car accident in the Bronx at the heart of the novel, in the end he's not a very sympathetic and multi-dimensional character. Character development and character study are not Wolfe's strong suit. The book has to be appreciated more as social commentary and parody than as literature.

But the parody is quite good. I loved the fun Wolfe has as the expense of the English journalist who breaks the McCoy story. The descriptions of his hangovers and resentments are just great. And Wolfe always gives a vivid picture of his characters through their dress and mannerisms.

A very funny, if flawed, book.

I read this recently for the first time searching for a zeitgeist for the times. Wolfe is a journalist/ documentary writer by reputation. I also watched the movie, by Brian De Palma, which should be seen after reading the novel, because they are spatially quite different. Alain Renais, whose documentary roots eventually led him to collaborate with writer Alian Robbe-Grillet (Noveau Roman) on Last Year at Marienbad, would have been a perfect choice for director. More on De Palma later.
The culture of New York; racial, ethnic, and class distinctions, is on display, a society which is completely foreign to many of us. The architectural achievements in the Bronx are all that keeps this place from becoming an apocalyptic scene in a more sensational novel, or film. To paraphrase Wolfe, and Resnais, the architecture is the story. The Master is a million a year bond trader, who has difficulty explaining to his daughter, or his lawyer father, exactly what it is he does. His wife is the keeper of the architectural milieu, the art director in the movie that his life has become.
He lives in a prison with golden bars.
The deal he makes for French bonds, his acumen at his job, is quaint by modern standards. Financial complexities have morphed on monetary steroids, as well as paper asset valuations since 1987. Wolfe holds to the documentary context, even in places where he might have shined as novelist, such as the death of Arthur Ruskin at a posh dinner with the tabloid reporter, Peter Fallow. The writer by some accounts destroyed the novel with his earlier work, and he takes up the cause here, perhaps only to throw the well established literary form into the fire, with the rest of the vanities.
The purpose of the film maker then was to provide a bit of brevity (and levity) and De Palma does not disappoint. He regards his environment using a stylistic fling, like a handful of fresh salmon taken from a waiters tray and hurled indiscriminately. The film is comic opera, while the novel is historical, in the ongoing sense of the word. The sheer volume of words is not as important as the time it takes to read them, but the disconnect between the two forms is abrupt, and difficult (though not impossible) to resolve intellectually. As for being a touchstone for our times, I think it gives you some insight into how a billionaire NY real estate developer could win a presidential election by currying votes in rural states where the experience and moral values are by tradition as far apart as any on the planet and how the fact of being president also makes you a perennial defendant of life, liberty and success, as it exists in America today. The novel could have been different, which is not to say it could have been better and like those of us who try to understand the complexities of modern global finance, it often reads like science fiction, a literary form which depends on an undue attention to physical description.
The plot resembles that of The Great Gatsby. It is merely modern, in a post modern world.

This was quite good - the first Tom Wolfe novel I've read. I was only a few years old when the Mercury program came to fruition and wasn't as knowledgeable about it as the later Gemini and Apollo programs. I'd seen the movie years ago but remember very little about it. This book provides a lot of detail regarding not only the personalities/histories of the seven pilots, but also their significant others.

The process of selecting the pilots and then choosing the order in which they'd be launched into orbit (or sub-orbit) and the politics involved and the individual jockeying for position was all quite interesting. The amount of fame they were showered with was amazing - caught all the other military fly boys off guard - hey, they were only along as a passenger, not piloting the craft, right......??

Anyone interested in the early space program should enjoy this story.

I finished reading this, my first Tom Wolfe book, shortly before he unexpectedly passed away this past May. It’s a witty, fast-paced, highly entertaining nonfiction narrative about the military pilots (most of them test pilots, some fighter) who became America’s first astronauts. It’s one of the more fun reads I’ve had in a long time, partially because of the highly competitive and frat-like pilot culture, partially because the national stakes were so high (we had to beat the Russians!), partially because the media operated so differently in the late 50s and early 60s (almost as the government’s public relations department), and partially because I listened to the audible version narrated by Dennis Quaid, who absolutely nailed the accents and pilot vernacular.

“The torrent of syllables was like a bad smell….. The Lion's nostrils quivered, and his jaw muscles bunched up, as if he were trying to keep from retching.” One of the greatest lines in the book, and the book itself is the greatest English-language novel of the 20th century and, coming as it did at the tail end of the century, perfectly encapsulated just about all of the foolishness, hypocrisy, greed, relentless compromising, faux high-dudgeon, penchant for finger-pointing and lack of self honesty that is the hallmark of the world we live in. (Heck, as the novel puts it, let’s toss in pain, panic, cowardice, weakness, deceit, shame and indignity while we’re at it!) It’s Wolfe’s masterpiece, far better than any of his other good books (Charlotte Simmons, Right Stuff, Our House/Bauhaus, etc.) and obviously far, far better than the iffy stuff (Back to Blood, Kingdom of Speech), and it will stand forever with the best satires ever penned.

Six stars.

Wolfe’s big 80s satire is a strange beast. In some respects it works very well and in others it is dissatisfying, even irritating. The plot itself is really rather simple but Wolfe compensates for this by closely examining the day-to-day lives and experiences of his characters, and although not much actually happens what does occur is described at length and with flourish. The characters are larger than life and again Wolfe delights in telling us much about their appearance, mores, and behaviours. Unfortunately not one of them is relatable or likeable. He is very good at imparting the growing sense of fear and desperation felt by Sherman McCoy, especially during certain lengthy depictions of his experiences at the hands of the New York judicial system, but it’s hard to care much because McCoy is so unsympathetic. Wolfe is annoyingly fond of homophonous interpretations of accents and the sounds people make, and he also has something of an obsession with exclamation marks (there are scores in the first few pages alone, although he does calm down a little after that). I also felt a little cheated by the fact that many of the characters reach no resolution and simply fade away as the book progresses. Even the epilogue, which hastily ties up some of their stories (including McCoy’s) reads like an afterthought and is not as convincing as I would have liked. THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES is like a feast of lavish snacks rather than a wholesome meal, and ultimately fails to live up to its many sumptuous parts. But Wolfe writes with skill and verve and this is never a dull book even if it’s not as satisfying as it should be.

The Bonfire of the Vanities is truly the book of the 80's.

I read it in the early 90's and thought it was just fantastic. I instinctively knew that it was truly the book of the 80's.

Reading the book again, I saw several faults this time around. I found Tom Wolfe's description to be overly long and that between 100 and 200 pages could have been safely chopped out. He picked several moments to drag out on a lot of pages. It was annoying at times. The ending was completely unsatisfying, a fact that Tom Wolfe freely admitted to have hated it.

The worst of them all was the infamous movie; what a disaster because the book had the chance of being easily filmmable.

All in all, The Bonfire of the Vanities is one of the greatest, if flawed, books ever written.

This novel still reads well and remains topical after more than twenty-five years. Mr. Wolfe handles confrontations with great verve and wit - these are confrontations between very distinct groups of people - bankers, district attorneys, ghetto thugs, preachers, journalists, detectives... Mr. Wolfe also perpetuates tremendous momentum through-out this six hundred page book.

His observations of society through these different class groups are astute. For instance the detectives are bewildered by the Park Avenue doorman dressed in their Napoleonic regalia rushing into the street to flag a taxi. It is beneath the dignity of upper Manhattan types to do such a lowly activity. He explodes the bubble surrounding each class type. Within the varied encounters Mr. Wolfe illustrates the isolation felt by his characters.

His settings - especially the fortress courtroom in the Bronx are well depicted and felt. Mr. Wolfe tells us that the lawyers within the courtroom dare not venture into the surrounding neighborhoods - they even order in for coffee. The deli lunch euphoria at their desks with their plastic containers of ketchup, mustard, relish, mayonnaise... is a contrast with the Fifth Avenue soirees embellished by tables of elaborate floral arrangements.

Perhaps the ending is a little too sudden and is somewhat inconclusive. And too some extent none of the characters are particularly likeable - they all seem out to get something - money, women, status. To some extent Mr. Wolfe adjusted his characters in his future novels to make them more appealing.

In many ways this is a novel about class cultures meeting and confronting each other - and all this in a New York setting where all is within walking and subway proximity. Mr. Wolfe, as stated elsewhere, captures the "carnival of life" - New York style.

Although I never lived in NYC, and know little about the markets, I knew the characters Wolfe has created. The most dispicable character in my humble opinion, are the two politicians, and the character of the Rev Al Shapton, who is a quasi politician. Wolfe candidly describes the problems of the courts, the justice system and we the people with all our faults and blemishes.

As Clarence Darrow once said about his two thrill killer clients,"even rich people are entitled to a defense." I do not find Sherman as a hateful character. Perhaps because I do not find fault with someone who makes a lot more than I, or someone who is unfaithfull. The only flaw I find is my failure to understand how some one is "master of the universe" can turn into the mush Wolfe makes of him. There were a few moments when Sherman shows his "manhood". But most of the time, he seems a quivering mass of tepidity. (if there is such a word.)

This novel was written before the incident at Duke, where the local DA, for political purposes, tries to convict the Duke La Crosse team. The real villians of the criminal justice system are no longer the Bull Conners of the past, but the elected DA's other public officials, and yes, the minorities who blindly follow people who are not their saviors, but self promoters. I think Wolfe was brave enough to write this story keeping political correctness out of his work. Wolfe has described our society with the shades drawn up. The novel reminds me of thelong running TV series,which somehow managed to be a comedy. I think it was sucessful because it showed everyone's pretensions, faults, and contradictions of personalities and groups.
Nobody, from parents, gays, and all ethnic groups were treated equally.

Compared to most of the trash that is written today, this novel is probably going to last beyond our generation. It is an accurate description of our times. The language uses 4 letter words accurately, as used in life, not for the sake of foul language, or sex to spice a story with sophomoric writing, for sophomoric readers, and publishers who promote and encourage writers to produce trash, instead of art.

If you are looking for a book with a hero, don't read this. There are few real hero's in real life, and there are none to be found here. In the end, perhaps Sherman, becomes a hero because he apparently learns something he didn't know when the novel begins. Finding knowledge in a pile of poop is something most people never learn.

Sherman McCoy is a wealthy Wall Street trader at his peak, with an opulent home, a beautiful wife, an adorable daughter, and a hell-hot mistress. Although Sherman basks in his success, he’s not just an egoistic snob. He’s frustrated by his wife’s limitless extravagances. He’s disdainful of the superficiality he’s surrounded with. He works hard, he respects his superiors, and he cherishes his little girl. But when he and his mistress inadvertently drive his Mercedes off their planned course and into the Bronx, Sherman’s perfectly aligned world is tipped off its axis by a run-in with two young black men, setting off a slow spin that gains frightening momentum page by page. Sherman is flung into a universe that he was previously untouched by ‒ protesters, press hounds, detectives, thugs, corrupt clergy, hardened attorneys, and a walloping media frenzy.

I don’t remember how "The Bonfire of the Vanities" found its way onto my bookshelf, but based on the author, I knew I had to read it. (And as usual, no, I haven’t seen the movie.) It’s a pop-culture hit from the 1980s, so it feels a little dated, but if you were awake during that time, you’ll love how accurately Wolfe captures the zeitgeist. He titillates your schadenfreude as Wall Street Whitey topples from his pinnacle, but he nurtures your empathy as Sherman is humanized by his struggles. You’ll likely find yourself rooting for Sherman, especially given the distastefulness of most of his foes, whose ego-driven motives are arguably more shameful than his own.

The novel is rife with casual racism and sexism. To me, it seems exaggerated for the era, but I was, admittedly, sheltered, so maybe the attitudes aren’t inaccurate. If you offend easily, you’ll be challenged. Approach it as an education.

I’ve been in love with Wolfe since I read "The Right Stuff" over a decade ago. "The Bonfire of the Vanities" also delivers in his characteristic sharp, masculine, high-energy style. The setting is old-pop, but the writing prevails. It’s true literature, the kind of stuff that makes Americans proud of our great authors, and Tom Wolfe is one of them.

(Check out my other reviews at ninasbookieblog.blogspot.com.)

I did not expect to enjoy or even finish reading this novel. Instead, I found it a real page-turner and having now at last, about a quarter century after it first appeared, consumed it cover to cover, I concur that it probably belongs on the list of Great American Novels.
It centers around a fear that, while seldom in my hearing mentioned, must run deep and widespread in the human spirit: In the pinch, would "I" be a hit and run driver? This happens to Sherman McCoy, under probably the most aggravated and embarrassing conditions imaginable. These few minutes change his life forever and cause a short-term furor in the life of New York City. How and why other people, including but not limited to an alcohol-sodden British newspaperman working over here, a young assistant D.A., a rabble-rousing preacher, and the investigating detectives, swirl around in this human whirlwind fills over 600 (700 in some editions) gripping pages.
The female characters all seem relatively minor and don't come off very well. This failed to annoy my own feminist instincts, because the male characters don't come off very well, either. I didn't much like any of them, which usually kills my interest in a piece of fiction. But, though I didn't really like them, I felt for them. All the viewpoint characters struck me as more or less interchangeable with one another, but this could be Wolfe's point: they also seemed interchangeable with the reader. Wolfe may have drawn only one human mind, but he has drawn that one superlatively well. The characters resemble little individual buttons popping up from that big human mushroom, New York City, itself a microcosm of the world. Only their sets of circumstances vary. Put Sherman McCoy and Larry Kramer in each other's life circumstances, and they would act the same way. In fact, we already see Kramer unconsciously aping McCoy's more prosperous incarnation in the matter of extra-marital relations.
What it seems to me Tom Wolfe has done is hold up a mirror to the spirit of humanity. It doesn't give us the most comfortable or comforting reflection, but, seasoned with turns of wry satirical humor in unexpected passages, and ending the way it does -- I will not play the spoiler here -- its cumulative effect was not totally depressing. I surfaced again after the epilogue with the sense that there might possibly be some small grain of hope for us as a species.
As a novelist myself, on a far smaller scale, I keenly appreciated Wolfe's control of his material. That he led me, a woman, so thoroughly into the mindset of his male characters (I remember only one short paragraph from a female character's point of view) suggests to me that he might be another of these male authors needlessly buffaloed by "the woman's perception," as if we were two different and separate species rather than two human variants with more in common than not.
In sum, this is a major achievement, and those who applauded it back in 1987 were entirely right to do so.

Wolfe has the ability to capture the spirit of a decade within a novel, but as I read the thoughts of the 80s bond trader as he reads newspaper articles about himself and his impending trial, it feels like a retelling of Camus' The Stranger. Before you laugh, both stories involve someone falling out of society after harming someone on the periphery of that society - an Arab in French North Africa, or a man walking at night in the Bronx - and ending up on trial. During the trial Camus' protagonist listens to his life being described by the court and feels dissociated from the way his life is being described. Marie is called his "mistress", but to him she is only "Marie". Wolfe's character reads about his mistress and wife in the newspaper but empathizes with each character differently. I recently read a book written by a screenwriter who said that the soul of the film Citizen Kane is that no one's life can be truly known by any outsider. Both books have this alienation of the individual from society at their center.

While trying to illustrate the various corruptions of New York in the 1980's, the author himself has created a junk piece of writing by totally corrupting justice himself. If one believed in this novel, one might as well slit one's own throat. The ultimate cynicism is creating a way of making money from your cynical viewpoint. Suck up the money, Mr. Wolfe, while you are trying to castigate others who are doing the same thing!

I didn't see the movie until many years after it came out. When I did, the intentional mythologizing of history really grabbed me. I just had to read the book.

The book didn't disappoint. Wolfe's account of the early Space Race was both fascinating and hilarious.I've never forgotten his colorful expose` on the collective subconscious of the testpilots/astronauts, in particular. Like the ziggarat metaphor used to describe the egocentric construct of the unspoken hierarchy according to how much of the Right Stuff each individual thought he and his peers possessed. In fact, I was obsessed with Wolfe's depiction for a while. I was rubbing elbows with military pilots at the time, and considering becoming one myself, and could see the truth in it: huge egos and equally enormous wristwatches.

I at least had the ego.

Anyway, the psychological insights are only dressing for the thorough investigative reporting Wolfe wove into an informative and entertaining inside story of an elite subculture in history.

For those who haven't both read the book and seen the film, I encourage you to correct that. It's not a case of one being better than the other; instead they compliment each other.

It may take readers few chapters to acclimate themselves to the breakneck pace of The Bonfire of the Vanities, but the time is an investments that pays off in a wonderful, entertaining tale of an era that not too long ago provoked intense social discussion. Thomas Wolff's best seller evokes a period where New York City tried to crawl out of the fiscal doldrums of the mid to late 1970s. The Federal Reserve Board decided in 1979 to stop defending interest rates, which led to unprecedented trading in the bond market. Price was inversely related to interest rates, and firms that could price bonds properly in a time of fluctuating interest rates could make big money. Some of these professionals earned enormous amounts of money. This veneer of gold beside a decaying city provided the backdrop for Wolff's tale.

The urban decay of the 1950s became an epidemic in the 1960s, then a fact of life in the 1970s. Cities may not have gotten worse in the 1970s, but its symptoms were more prevalent. New York City defaulted on some municipal bonds in 1975. It had a massive power outage in 1977, and Howard Cosell announced during a post-season game that the Bronx was burning due to a fire visible from Yankee Stadium. Though New York City has never been one to dwell on its historical sights, the seventies saw unprecedented dilapidation in Grant's Tomb and other landmarks. Most subway cars were plastered with graffiti.

Within the city, small enclaves of wealth took foothold in areas such as Park Avenue and the Upper East Side. The Upper West Side had transformed from the area that Saul Bellow wrote about in the late 1950s to another yuppie haven. These residents still had many of the fears of the rest of the city that its former residents, who fled to the suburbs and elsewhere, wished to escape - particularly when they were not traveling in familiar areas. Sherman McCoy and Maria Ruskin exhibited those fears when they took a wrong turn off the Triboro bridge and ended up, probably, following the Bruckner expressway to somewhere in the Hunts Point neighborhood.

The silence of the victim, Henry Lamb, is contrasted by the boisterous protests of Reverend Reginald Bacon, a character that Wolff merely borrowed from the Reverend Al Sharpton. Sharpton wasn't well-known during the setting of Bonfire of the Vanities, but he began to make a name for himself with his racially polarized stances on isolated cases of urban misunderstanding in the mid-1980s. Sharpton fed into sales of Wolff's book in 1987 when the reverend accepted the story of Tawana Brawley, and launched a furious campaign against the district attorneys of Westchester County for covering-up a crime. In fact, a hoax had been committed - and a jury ruled that Sharpton had known this, yet recklessly and maliciously attacked a junior prosecutor named Stephen Pagones for inaction. Pagones later won a substantial lawsuit against Sharpton, who never paid, claiming indigence.

The victim's mother, Annie Lamb, was a member of Bacon's church, and came to the Reverend with the story of her son hit by a Mercedes and lying in intensive care while the driver of the car fled the scene. Sherman McCoy did flee the scene, because he thought the two boys were up to no good. It wasn't necessarily Lamb that put fear into Sherman and Maria; it was the large boy in the Celtics jacket who was with Henry at the time. The actions of the yuppies are not too far removed from what many people would have done in the same situation. A friend of mine told me a story about a carjacking in Overton - in Miami - which began when someone ran in front of the car, forcing the driver to slam on the breaks. The car was then attacked by several others in cahoots with the man who ran in front of the car to stop it. The moral of his story was that his father should have run the guy over and gotten the hell out. Nobody wants to be a hit-and-run driver, but nobody wants to be robbed, either. It is a thought-provoking dilemma.

The Lamb Case was publicized by an alcoholic reporter in a small local paper that hadn't written a good story in several years. Peter Fallow was destined to be fired from the City Light for ineffectiveness at his job, and his personal life consisted of mooching free drinks and food at a local pub by finding a sucker to get stuck with the bill. If Fallow woke before noontime, it was because someone woke him up. This story was a remarkable boost to his career - in fact, we learn at the end just how far he could run with the story.

A number of coincidences must occur before this case can get any traction - and, remarkably, they do! For example, Maria is having an affair with an artist, Filippo Chirazzi, while she is entertaining McCoy. This artist also knew Caroline Heftshank, one of the Brits who frequented Leicester's, a local hangout of Brits in America. When he failed to call Caroline, whose interest in the artist failed to match his interest in her, she told Peter Fallow about the artist's involvement with Maria and some conversations that linked Maria to Sherman McCoy.

Nearly every character in the story has an ulterior motive, and how these play out is a remarkable social statement of the decade. The power-broker becomes a scared, witless dolt. The beauty with the brown-lipstick distracts the married assistant prosecutor. Even a simple matter of speech is laden with innuendo. Wolff captures the decade in one compelling, impossible-to-put-down story that ought to appeal to anyone.

New York City in the Big '80s is the backdrop, lead actor, and punchline of this fantastic, sprawling, richly detailed and realized debut novel by famous New Journalist Tom Wolfe.

"Punchline," you might ask? Well, consider that the book was published just before a bond seller named Michael Milken galvanized the city with his sordid and high-profile arrest and just before a New York State schoolgirl named Tawana Brawley dropped a racially-explosive bombshell regarding her apparent victimhood at the hands of whites. In the book the bond salesman is named Sherman McCoy; the "victimized" student is named Henry Lamb. You kind of get the feeling Wolfe here was trying out something called "New New Journalism", i. e. reporting on the story before it even happens.

Beyond its headline-stealing, the book is a rich stew of dramatic juxtaposition, political and social commentary, characterization and caricature, all boiled in the broth of a New York Wolfe toiled in for years and had researched at length for this novel. At times it reminds you of that famous New York-based TV series that came after, "Law & Order," with its in-depth examination of what goes on in a Bronx courthouse as a DA and his minions examine the Lamb case and what to do with it. At other times it reminds you of that other '90s TV series set in the city, "Seinfeld," with its amusement at people's baser selves and its development of an insular lingo. As he strides among Manhattan's upper-crust set, McCoy sees women as either older "social x-rays" or younger "lemon tarts;" partiers ask for sparkling water, not Perrier; and interior designers shudder at the memory of mirror overuse, a. k. a. "Mirror Indigestion."

Most famously, Sherman styles himself a "Master of the Universe," the phrase that stuck with people most here. Sherman's hubris is the source of much of "Bonfire's" first-half satire; his downfall and discovery of a certain dignity provides "Bonfire's" second-half uplift.

"Bonfire" doesn't focus solely on McCoy. There's a prosecutor named Kramer who shares his boss's longing for finding someone known as the "Great White Defendant," a big-name criminal suspect who isn't black and poor. There's also Peter Fallow, an alcoholic reporter who finds his feet covering the Lamb case for the sensationalist New York Post, em, I mean City Light.

Floating around the edges of the story are other characters whose minds we never get to enter. One, Reverend Bacon, is a black minister and pressure-group leader who steals money from a white upper-crust church and waves off their complaints, telling them he's their "prudent broker...who can control the steam" of the inner city. He's the one who works up the people when McCoy's case comes to trial. Bacon's resemblance to one Al Sharpton may or may not be incidental: Sharpton was another real-life character who didn't raise his profile to a national level until after "Bonfire's" publication. Wolfe isn't afraid to push racial buttons, or skewer targets of varied ethnicities, to make his points about the baseline dysfunction dogging NYC.

The book doesn't always work at the same high level. Kramer starts out a pretty interesting character before devolves into a one-dimensional horndog, while Fallow's comic inability to grasp basic American culture seems strained. There's a speech in the middle of the book by a novelist dying of AIDS who references Edgar Allen Poe's "Masque Of The Red Death" (Poe Towers is also the name of the housing project where Lamb is from) in a way that feels like Wolfe straining for the kind of literary affect he captures elsewhere in stride.

The book scores so often you ignore the off-notes like you would a weak pun in Shakespeare. In McCoy, Wolfe creates a wonderfully perverse yet strangely sympathetic figure. You will hate him in the beginning, yet as he is pulled and twisted by the system that fed him for so long, you begin to care, and recognize in him something of a common humanity. I think it's this element that gives the book a hidden depth that stays with you after the laughs fade.

For me, "Bonfire" is a richly rewarding reading experience, married to its time in a wonderfully redolent way yet not limited by it in terms of message. It's not like the kind of greed McCoy embodied went away with Ronald Reagan, Culture Club, and big hair, or that color-blindness now reigns supreme. I think mirrors may even be making a comeback. "Bonfire" is not only a laugh-getter and a reader roller-coaster; its social commentary remains sharp as ever.

I hated this book. Description, description and more description. I got around 25% of this book and realized that I was skimming through around 80% of what I had read and finally, gladly, deleted it from my Kindle. Page after page descriptions of everything in detail. A room, every piece of furniture in a room is described over 15 pages, a bathroom, more description, a street, page after page of description, everything described in detail until I lost track of the story. I loved the Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. From there I read Atlanta. I struggled through Atlanta but hated all the description. This was years ago and I vowed to never read a Tom Wolfe book again. If you like a constant description for page after page you will love this book. As for me a some description is great to give the feel of the place/thing/person but to have it intrude on the story line is too much.

Sherman McCoy, a snobbish WASP bond trader, and his mistress make a wrong turn on their way back from the airport and find themselves in the middle of the Bronx. This one misstep leads to a series of events that expose the problems within the law system and how easy it is to manipulate it for ones own means.

I couldn't help thinking when reading this novel how relevant Wolfe's writing still is today. Greed, capitalism, us vs. them tensions, and the machinations of Wall Street. After the Financial Crisis of 2008 based in Wall Street, those themes have just as much meaning today as they did during the late 80's. What's best though, is that Wolfe doesn't sermonize or tell you how you should feel about what his writing is exposing. He just introduces you to the undercurrents rocking NYC and allows you to form your own opinions.

It's a little long, as it takes awhile for Wolfe to make all of his points he seems to want to make. But, as I enjoyed every page, I didn't find the fact that the story was a little slow at times to be a turnoff. Filled with intriguing characters, Bonfire of the Vanities is a must read.

Conspicuous consumption, shoulder padded-blazers, a roaring bond market, and other hallmarks of 80's culture seem dated enough today to be comical, and The Bonfire of the Vanities is very much a novel of its time. So what's to recommend this portly tome to readers 25 years later? Some of the same traits that mark all great fiction, yet which are particular strengths of Wolfe's: a keen ear for dialect, an almost discomfitingly keen understanding of human nature, and finally, descriptive bon mots that cast the world anew while also giving a "Yes! That's _exactly_ how it is!" satisfaction.

While the cultural trappings of mid-80's New York no longer apply, everything that makes this book move still feels bracingly current: the thrill and lust for power, journalism's drive for The Story, political machinations, the grimy real-world operations of the law, Society etiquette, racial tensions, and those errors in judgement upon which fates turn. The book is a colorful, vivid illustration of how the issues may change, but people stay the same.

For the writer, there is much to relish in Wolfe's rich vocabulary and continually inventive turns of phrase. I found myself thinking of the old writers' adage "Show, don't tell," and then thinking "But if you can do it this well, tell away!" The witticisms are too many to quote, yet too delicious to omit entirely. Speaking of an office building, Wolfe writes ". . . a glass tower that rose up sixty stories from out of the gloomy groin of Wall Street." Discussing a hung-over character who's attempting not to remember last night's follies, he says "Whatever he had done was submerged like a monster at the bottom of a cold dark lake." In a trendy restaurant we hear the "aerobic voices of the young and swell," and at a socialite party we envision "Two men and an impeccably emaciated woman." There's a lot more where that came from, but I'll let you discover them for yourself.

Tom Wolfe broke new ground with “The Right Stuff.” He introduced new terms into the English language such as “pushing the envelope” and “the right stuff,” and revealed the real story behind the seven Mercury astronauts, the story of Air Force test pilots who routinely risked their lives developing jet fighters for the United States Air Force, and of what it takes to land a 15-ton F-4 Phantom on a 1100-foot aircraft carrier in the days before computer-assisted flight. Were the Mercury astronauts ever afraid of space flight? Not at all. But they never overcame their fear of “night carrier landing,” which only those with “the right stuff” performed with routine élan.

I grew up in the California High Desert where a good portion of “The Right Stuff” takes place. My father worked at Edwards Air Force, where Chuck Yeager made history as the first man to break the sound barrier. I’ve seen Muroc Dry Lake. I’m familiar with “the white fence farms” of the Antelope Valley where a number of aeronautical engineers, Air Force personnel (including pilots) and factory workers lived. While I was attending Antelope Valley Community College in the late 1960s, the campus newspaper interviewed Pancho Barnes for an article about her days running a saloon attended by Chuck Yeager and a bevy of young test pilots. Wolfe captures these people, their adventures at Pancho’s and their daring deeds over the California desert with humor, hyperbole, and awesome thoroughness.

My favorite section is about the carrier landings. If you’re familiar with Wolfe’s prior books, you know the writing is vintage Tom Wolfe. Wolfe describes the landing deck as “a skillet!—a frying pan—a short order grill!—not gray but black, smeared with skid marks from one end to the other and glistening with pools of hydraulic fluid and the occasional jet-fuel slick, all of it still hot, sticky, greasy, runny, virulent from God knows what traumas—still ablaze!—consumed in detonations, explosions, flames, combustions, roars, shrieks, whines, blasts, horrible shudders, fracturing impacts, as little men in screaming red and yellow and purple and green shirts with black Mickey Mouse helmets over their ears skittered about on the surface as if for their very lives (you’ve said it now!), hooking fighter planes onto the catapult shuttles so they can explode their afterburners and be slung off the deck in a red-mad fury with a kaboom! that pounds through the deck—a procedure that seems absolutely controlled, orderly, sublime, however, compared what he is about to watch as aircraft return to the ship for what is known in the engineering stoicism of the military as ‘recovery and arrest.’” Whew. Those who triumphed over such mayhem and actually landed supersonic jet on a carrier deck are the true possessors of “The Right Stuff.” If you haven’t already read this marvelous book, do so. Reading Wolfe is a flat-out joy.

A lot of the store reviewers used the term satire for "The Bonfire of the Vanities". I am assuming that people meant sarcasm, not satire. There is a subtle difference.

Tom Wolfe's story goes down to the core. It is a blunt tale of the world that we live in. Not a lot has changed since the 80s. The main stances are still valid. This is quite perceptible in highly corrupt Third World countries, more specifically the manipulation of the masses. But it is also true in our Western civilized world, each time more politically correct and afraid to speak up.

Sometimes Wolfe was a little too excessive. He just went too far on a couple of episodes and I could not digest very well. But the end is such a beauty that I pardoned all Wolfe's transgressions after I finished.

I wonder if Brecht would enjoy it...

"The Bonfire of the Vanities" by Tom Wolfe

New York City, early 1980's; Sherman McCoy, a self proclaimed "Master of the universe" had it all. A loving family, a multi-million dollar Park Avenue apartment and he is the top producing bond salesman for a Wall Street firm which pays him 1 million dollars a year and more if he can close his latest deal. This wasn't enough for Sherman though; he needed, no, deserved more. He is a master of the universe after all. Sherman became involved in an extra marital affair which he deserved and after a wrong turn ends up on the wrong side of the law. Maybe Sherman isn't the Master of the universe he had initially believed...

Bonfire made for a great read and Wolfe seems to have really captured the essence of that era. The characters be they the richest of the rich or barely able to afford their one bedroom apartment are all driven by their ego and Wolfe has captured this masterfully. Watching these characters and their rise or fall is what makes this story an interesting read.

The Good: Wolfe writes great characters and throughout the story we see some of them go through a complete evolution. None of the characters garner much sympathy from the reader out of the gate but as the story goes on that changes dramatically and by the end you may even find yourself feeling sorry for some them. The lifestyles captured are fascinating if for no other reason that to see how the super wealthy flaunt their power and influence and how no matter how much you make you can still be tapped out.

The Bad: The story does feel a little long winded at times but not to the point of ruination.

Overall: Wolfe's ability to draw and evolve interesting characters is what makes this journey worth taking. If it sounds interesting then pick it up and give it a try.

Set amid the glamour and debauchery of 1980’s New York City, Wolfe’s first novel serves up a densely-packed morsel of time and place—taking the author’s legendary investigative journalism to new literary heights. Reader, be warned: this Bonfire is a roaring triumph from start to finish.

A hit-and-run accident in the heart of the Bronx threatens the downfall of self-proclaimed “Master of the Universe,” bond-tradesman millionaire Sherman McCoy. What follows is a fast-paced tailspin through the decadent hallways and backrooms of New York City’s glitterati and Wall Street elite, alongside the high-density low-income housing units of those whose shoulders upon which both stand. No sooner does Wolfe’s dolefully vain antihero, McCoy, seek legal immunity than the upper and lower who’s-who of New York City spirals into a melee of all-out class warfare.

In one hand, Bonfire methodically peels away the perfectly-coiffed veneer of New York City high life, leaving no imported, one-of-a-kind, custom-made stone unturned. In the other, Bonfire scrutinizes the city’s slums and dependents with much the same tenor, granting little in the way of PC clemency: to Wolfe, all is fair game, and all is necessary for the pitch of this book. In the end, this tome exposes the superstructure and underlying stanchions of America’s most beloved city—a city deeply mired in racist, classist, and socially-errant waters, and fraught with a glad-handing legal system wherein justice is granted, unexceptionally, to the highest bidder. In this novel, rare is the unblemished do-gooder, and many are the shamelessly self-interested, primly protecting their own necks.

For a Wolfe newcomer, I envy the journey upon which you will (hopefully) soon embark: the quality of writing is second to none, and the gross extent of his preparation makes for books so richly detailed that the world in which you live will soon feel a bit duller in comparison—but all for the best.

For those well-versed with The Man in White, Bonfire is as good as you wanted it to be, if not better. Here is a taste of the delicious, odious vanity of Sherman McCoy, Master of the Universe:

“There it was, the Rome, the Paris, the London of the twentieth century, the city of ambition, the dense magnetic rock, the irresistible destination of all those who insist on being where things are happening—and he was among the victors! He lived on Park Avenue, the street of dreams! He worked on Wall Street, fifty floors up, for the legendary Pierce & Pierce, overlooking the world! He was at the wheel of a $48,000 roadster with one of the most beautiful women in New York—no Comp. Lit. scholar, perhaps, but gorgeous—beside him! A frisky young animal! He was of that breed whose natural destiny it was…to have what they wanted!” (77)

I loved Bonfire so much that I did everything in my power to prolong my reading. Bonfire, like much of Wolfe’s work, is a book to be savored, page by glorious page—albeit guiltily—and learned from, and then framed in an imported, one-of-a-kind, custom-made frame.

For decades I have been told I should read Bonfire, and I don't know why it took me more than twenty years to get around to it. I lived in New York City throughout the 1980's (when I was in my twenties) and worked for both a Wall Street law firm and the District Attorney's Office, so the settings are very familiar, and I'm a Tom Wolfe fan, having read The Right Stuff and A Man in Full long ago. Wolfe is in top form here, and his cynical, microscope's-eye view through the dozens of individual set pieces is amazing. This book is a fabulous achievement. Long as the book was, I couldn't get enough of it, and there is no doubt that this fiction contains a lot of truth. So why only four stars? Well, its "truthiness" (a phrase coined by Stephen Colbert that Tom Wolfe undoubtedly wishes he had come up with) is part of the problem, particularly with the African-American and female characters. While the caricatures of black and female real-world actors (a thinly-veiled Al Sharpton, a real-estate-agent-I-have-known) are spot on, Wolfe nowhere conveys the essential humanity of either group: blacks are "the mob"--ignorant, manipulable, and dangerous, even if the victim of circumstance; women are shallow, defined completely by their sexual attractiveness and utterly dependent on the men. Bad enough on its own, what makes this particularly problematic is that the "truthiness" of the work as a whole risks leaving these bogus stereotypes in the reader's mind as true as well. It's all the worse because the book is so good. (Also, only four stars because of the abrupt ending; in A Man in Full Wolfe carries his vision of masculinity and heroism through a remarkably similar story, but completes his vision with more of the resurrection of his "hero").

The Bonfire of the Vanities is the second Tom Wolfe book that I have read. The first was I Am Charlotte Simmons, which although flawed, I enjoyed. Still, this book (along with two other Wolfe titles) sat on my shelf for quite a while, intimidating me due to its thickness, as I like books that I can read through quickly. When I finally began reading this one, I found that in spite of its length, I was able to proceed quickly.

The Bonfire of the Vanities is the story of three men. Sherman McCoy is a high-salaried bond trader living with his wife and daughter in a Park Avenue apartment. In spite of his job and status, he finds himself worrying about money as it flows out as quickly as it comes in. His obsession is being a "Master of the Universe." Sherman is also romantically involved with Maria Ruskin, the young wife of an elderly businessman.

Larry Kramer is an assistant district attorney working in the Bronx. He also lives his wife and young child, but his conditions are much different. His tiny apartment would fit into McCoy's living room. Kramer experiences a combination of envy and disdain toward other lawyers with high-paying jobs at big firms, as he would like their salaries, but feels he is on the moral high road as he helps serve the public.

Finally, there is Peter Fallow, an alcoholic British journalist for a tabloid. Fallow has been down on his luck, and his main goal each day is to find ways to get free meals. Fallow tries to dupe his boss into thinking he is being productive, and also desires a lifestyle beyond his means.

The thread that ties the three characters together begins when McCoy and his mistress are involved in an accident where he may have hit someone while driving in the Bronx at night. He is conflicted over whether to report it, while his mistress says to forget about it as they don't know if anything actually happened. It turns out that they hit a young black man from the projects who was living a clean lifestyle, leaving him in a coma. Community leaders put pressure on the police and legal system to go after the perpetrator. Fallow is the reporter who breaks the story, while Kramer is the ADA in charge of prosecuting the case. When witnesses lead the investigation back to McCoy, the case becomes about race and social class.

In telling this story, the author presents a vivid description of New York during the 1980's. Having never been there, I can't judge whether this description is accurate, but it added a lot to the story. Also, the characters are very well fleshed out. Each has his own flaws and virtues, which evolve over time. The arrogant McCoy and the idealistic Kramer from the beginning are definitely depicted differently at the conclusion.

Overall, this was a well-written novel, and I will be dusting off and reading A Man in Full and The Right Stuff (eventually).

In all 31 flavors of "Law and Order on TV, the NYPD and DA's office disposes of a case from the incident to the trial in an hour--sometimes two if it's a two-part episode. In "Bonfire of the Vanities" Tom Wolfe does the same thing in about 700 pages. That's because Wolfe brings to bear all the complexities of trying a case in the real world.

In the mid-1980s, Sherman McCoy is a bond salesman at Pierce & Pierce, a self-described "Master of the Universe" with a three million-dollar apartment on Park Avenue, a wife who spends thousands on decorating it, a six-year-old daughter who attends a pricey private school, and a mistress named Maria Ruskin, who herself is wealthy from marrying a much-older man. One night Sherman goes to pick Maria up at the airport and their Mercedes Benz becomes lost on the seedy streets of the Bronx. They're approached by two black kids, and from there the "Master of the Universe" becomes an unwitting pawn of a black "reverend" hungry for publicity, a drunken British reporter hungry for a story, and a Bronx DA hungry for re-election. Because in the real world, cases aren't solved in an hour and "justice" is a game won or lost based on who can cheat the most and get away with it.

Like an ancient Greek tragedy, McCoy has to pay for his hubris. So do some of the other characters, although others are seemingly rewarded for their bad behavior. This is certainly not a novel of white hats and black hats where the good guys triumph and the bad guys get their just reward. If you want that, you'd better stick to the TV.

What Wolfe does so well with this book is to paint the "big picture" of New York City in the 1980s with its melting pot of Irish, Italians, Jews, blacks, Puerto Ricans, and Wasps. All of these rival factions collide with the McCoy case to depict not just the justice system, but society as a whole. It's an unflattering image to say the least, even viewed through the prism of satire. More importantly, the image of black against white and rich against poor is still applicable today in America's major cities. That makes Wolfe's book as relevant today as it was back in the `80s.

Wolfe's writing itself can get a little tedious and long-winded at times. There are so many nuances and complexities and tangents going on throughout the book. While these provide richness and depth, at some point it becomes overkill. The stuff about the mayor and the Episcopal Church was interesting, but not really necessary. As well there are...so many ellipses...and exclamation points! It can be a little irritating after 700 pages.

Still, it's a relatively minor flaw in what is a great book that even at 700 pages shouldn't take too long to read because it's so funny and clever that it's hard to put down. I had previously read Wolfe's "Man in Full" that came out ten years after "Bonfire of the Vanities" and has many of the similar themes of race, class, and a rich man in legal peril, though it takes place in Atlanta instead of New York. I'd recommend that book as well.

As for the 1990 movie of "Bonfire of the Vanities" it pretty much makes every critic's worst list, so I wouldn't recommend that. The movie does stick to at least most of the book's main points. In its defense, it would be impossible to depict all the subtleties and nuances of Wolfe's novel on the big screen. Trying to adapt it really was an impossible mission.

That is all...

I found the characters complex and believable. Many of them are shallow or superficial but that is the point - they are materialistic. This is not the same as saying that the characters were flat, one-dimensional, or undeveloped. The dialogue was well-written and conversational. This was the easiest 500+ page book I have ever read.

The book was insightful too for its criticism of the legal system and the materialism that pervades our culture. I was a child in the 80's so that time is largely removed from my memory. I've also been to New York only once. I still connected easily with the plot and characters. To see critical reviews complaining about issues such as these is sad. If you can't read a book about a place you've never been or an era before your time then you're missing the point of reading.

It wasn't long after I read this that the George Zimmerman - Trayvon Martin tragedy occurred and the fictional events depicted in this book served as an important reminder that I shouldn't jump to conclusions. Does that mean I think George Zimmer is innocent? It means I don't know and I don't think we'll ever know, regardless of what the legal system decides.

Without wanting to spoil anything in the book, I honestly found the journalist Peter Fallow the most despicable character in the book. Reverend Bacon was about as vile. None of the characters were really likable and many were deplorable but I think this added to realism of the story. In real life people are usually not very likable; just as in the book, I find most people to be self-serving jerks.

I also appreciated how the story unfolded from the vantage points of multiple characters. Each character had his own piece of the story and his or her own cliff hanger moments. The plot was artfully crafted so that no character's actions would spoil the cliff hanger where we left off with another character. That takes skill and care as a writer.

This was a fun book to read with several insightful moments that, for me at least, spurred critical thinking about our legal system and culture. What more would you want from a book?

You will be absorbed by this novel. You will inhabit the world of 1980s New York City. Actually, multiple worlds, as the city is populated by such starkly differing realities - affluence on a level that would make the Sun King blink; the nothing-left-to-lose hopelessness that gives rise to the dead-eye stare and the Pimp Roll -- that it's hard to believe these different realities could co-exist on the same planet, let alone the same city. But they do. And it's when these parallel universes, against all the rules of nature, happen to intersect that we truly catch a glimpse of the human condition.

The magic of Tom Wolfe is in his characters. The words on the page somehow transcend the normal intellectual process and mainline directly into the visceral. The reader absorbs the accents, the affectations, the environment and is pulled into the minds and the central nervous systems of all these supporting actors in the unfolding drama.

It is that very slice-of-life precision that distinguishes the realistic novel (The Grapes of Wrath, another example) from the avant-garde, high-brow fiction with strange names like Absurdist novels and Radical Disjunction. Give me something rooted in real life rather than some literary game, words on a page manipulated by an author. Wouldn't you agree that real life itself offers more than enough absurdity?

So what does the cast of characters teach us? First the good news is that some of the seething racist energy and the predatory criminal elements characterizing Wolfe's New York City of thirty years ago has been tamed and thus, to some degree, the novel can be seen as a period piece. Yet the `vanity of vanities, all is vanity' that animates virtually every character in the novel is as old as Ecclesiastes and is as fresh as yesterday's news.

We may do well to ponder in our own existence the degree to which we are defined, entrapped, entombed(?) by our own narrative - career; possessions; pedigree; wealth; alpha-maleness; beauty; partner - as if we're constructing a monument to ourselves. There is a poignant scene in the novel where Sherman McCoy's monument finally crumbles and one can't help but reflect on Jia's concept of surrender and wonder if the protagonist hasn't finally achieved bliss.

Expand the notion of vanity to include its scruffy half-brother, hubris, and we may have the answer to the life cycle that confronts many a company (confuse being lucky with being smart) or empire (imperial over-reach).

In any event, enjoy the ride (but, by all means, avoid the movie abomination).

Bang! Zoom! Pow!

If you like prose that crackles like sparklers in your eyes, and tells a good story besides, then Tom Wolfe's "The Right Stuff", about the Mercury 7 spaceflight program of the early 1960s, is for you.

Published in 1979, back when the U.S. was the world's laughing stock and "malaise" was the operative word from the White House, "The Right Stuff" calls to mind with equal degrees of snark and awe a time when real heroes walked the earth and flew beyond and around it. Men, yes, but heroes, too. Wolfe never lets go of the human element, in fact, the best thing "The Right Stuff" has going for it.

As a non-fiction novel, it has its limitations, too. Wolfe doesn't make up quotes, he hardly quotes the seven Mercury astronauts at the center of the story, except for flight transcripts and press conferences where their words are public record. But he doesn't seem to channel theirs or anyone else's voices, except Wolfe's own.

Beginning with the book's title, he uses a lot of terms to capture what the early U.S. space program, and the test flights on experimental jets leading up to it, were really about. Terms like "the great ziggurat" "flying & drinking and drinking & driving", "true brother", "the mighty integral", often in caps, get a lot of use even though there's no sign anyone ever used them or even thought them up before Wolfe did.

There's an overall tone of omnipotence that feels smug and gets in the way: Never mind what was going through John Glenn's mind when he was wondering if Friendship 7's heat shield had burned up on atmospheric reentry - here's what he REALLY MUST have thought!

But the book is so entertaining, it really compensates for Wolfe's excesses. The astronauts were not breaking new ground; everything they did the Soviets did too, except sooner and for longer durations. But they were putting their lives on the line as investments toward a larger purpose, an achievement no other country has matched in close to 40 years, landing on the moon. And they were also disproving the notion that Americans after World War II were doomed to failure, that "our boys always botch it" mentality which hung over the country at the time (and which by 1979 was back with a vengeance).

Sharp, funny, and full of graspable insights (the riders of the first Mercury capsules had as much control over their craft as does a Ferris-wheel rider), "The Right Stuff" may settle for entertainment over enlightenment, but it is very entertaining.

I just read a fantastic book (Hawaii: A Novel) where the author does an amazing job of getting into the heads of his ambitious and flawed human characters in a sweeping tale about greed in the Aloha State--a development deal where a Chinese billionaire wants to build a casino down the road from the Mormon church. The author says in his acknowledgements that he was basically trying to write a "Tom Wolfe" book about Hawaii, and the book was even called "our Bonfire of the Vanities" in the Honolulu Weekly, so I went back and re-read Wolfe's book to see what the author was talking about, and thank god I did! I used to think that your point-of-view characters had to be sympathetic people you could root for, but Wolfe provides this amazing narrative stance that gets you inside the heads of his characters, but somehow hovers above them at the same time inviting us to ridicule their selfish thoughts--but ridicule them in a way where we often have to admit that we would have been thinking the same thoughts in a similar situation. Kramer's bumbling attempts to have an affair with The Girl with the Brown Lipstick, or Sherman's attempts to justify his affair with Maria ("I am, after all, a Master of the Universe! Even my WIFE would understand!"), or the way Wolfe arcs Peter Fallow's connection to the journalistic scoop of the century ("Reverend Bacon provided me with all kinds of access--I owe my success to him!" becomes "I'm a genius--of course I did this all on my own!")--it's incredible how just as we laugh at these idiots, Wolfe gets us to look in the mirror at the same time and admit that even though it probably wasn't as extreme as cheating on your spouse, we all spend a lot of energy making "justifications" like this of one kind or another.

None of this speaks to the story, which is just as thought-out as Wolfe explains it in his brilliant essay, "Stalking the Billion-Footed Beast" (Yes, I went and googled that too)--a how-to that the author of "Hawaii" certainly read, too. Basically Wolfe says, here's how you write a Dickensian book for today: research it like it's a nonfiction journalistic endeavor, come up with characters that represent your locale (Dickens's London, contemporary Hawaii, Wolfe's New York City) from Low (crumbling South Bronx--at least through the eyes of white boys like Kramer and Sherman) to High (Park Avenue duplexes, Wall Street, swank restaurants, etc.), and set something in motion with a good What If that allows you to travel through all of it in great realistic convincing FUNNY detail INSIDE THE HEADS OF THESE CHARACTERS ("What if the Park Ave trust fundie winds up MAYBE running over the MAYBE thug who was MAYBE going to mug him, all in the climate of race-conflict-charged 1980s New York City?"). I've read that some of Wolfe's later works were "uneven," but this one, all 600-plus pages of it, is as tight as a Hemingway short story.

Finally, yeah it's a product of the 1980s, and the whole newspaper thing now seems ancient, but none of that matters. I'm so glad I was reminded to pick this book up again, because it's one of those you'll read again and again like every five years or so. LOVED IT!

In the years following WWII and Korea as the military graduated to fighter jets a certain hierarchy of talent developed. At the top of the pyramid were those in "flight test," where pilots with a certain indefinable something went to push the limits of the newest and most advanced jets. Landing several tons of metal atop a heaving and pitching aircraft carrier in the dark of night or "hanging your hide on the outside of the envelope" in experimental jets is a dangerous profession requiring what Mr. Wolfe calls "the Right Stuff." From Chuck Yeager, the first to exceed the speed of sound (Mach 1), to John Glenn and the other Mercury astronauts, few possess this right or "righteous stuff," and many are "left behind" on the climb up that pyramid. Mr. Wolfe introduces us to those who had it and some who died lacking it, as well as the competition of the "Space Race" of the 60s, and does so with a very distinct style that conveys the attitude of those who possessed it. The missions of the Mercury astronauts are covered in particular detail and sort of form the pinnacle of this story, from the enormous egos of some to the petty jealousies and politics that played out behind the perfect facade Life Magazine presented to the nation.

In fact, the most singular aspect of this book for me would be the style with which it is written, dripping with the huge egos and arrogance of the pilots. Theirs is a dangerous job with few monetary rewards, requiring them to sacrifice family life and comfort, but carrying a thrill few people will ever experience. This, Mr. Wolfe explains, results in a feeling of superiority which he portrays excellently with his writing. And he conveys this attitude with certain phrases he uses repeatedly throughout, such as the "right stuff" or "flying & drinking, and drinking & driving," or the "Friend of Widows and Orphans," etc. It becomes a kind of shorthand for the concepts within the fraternity of pilots and their families. It's very interesting to learn of the lives and successes and defeats, particularly Chuck Yeager and John Glenn. But it is also this style which began to wear on me after a while - on the one hand the story is incredibly interesting, but on the other I got really tired of reading it and couldn't wait to just be done with the book. Also, the language of the book is pretty coarse, and hardly a page goes by that doesn't have several profanities or vulgarities, so be forewarned if you're bothered by that. But a fascinating story nonetheless and I can't wait to watch the movie now.

I am sad to hear of the passing of Mr. Wolfe as i have been a fan since my late teens when i read the book about Kesey and the dead/pranksters.
I have recently in the past 3 years ventured in to his novels which i love. I have now read all of his novels and love them equally with Back to Blood and Bonfire standing out. I just read Bonfire last month and think it's absurd that it is know to be about the 80's. This story could of taken place in any decade and is about public hangings. This subject seems more important now than ever making his book seem to be about 2018.
Wolfe gets a lot of criticism because he has had some success. His style is not that journalistic and most of the complaints about him i can prove mathematically to be false. Wolfe is a master observer of socioeconomic climate and a great forecaster off this absurd element of American society.
Bonfire was his first attempt at a novel and this one feels more literary than the ones to follow. I actually like this level of balance then i also love the extreme opposite style such as in Back to Blood.
I feel this is clearly a character study and has an ati hero that you can feel compassion for unlike Charlie Croker from A Man In Full who i never ended up caring for even at the end. Sherman is the lead character in this story and is a wal street trader who actually dreams about living in the country and deep inside wants out, even before the dilemma that makes up the main conflict in the story.
I will not give away any of the story other than to say Sherman ends up being someone to look up to. He sort of takes on a wise enlightened caricature at the end. This is not giving away too much as it is made clear early on that Sherman is a decent guy.
Overall this book is about the absurdity of being caught up in a media based frenzy that can be profitable for multi careers. This is the same thing that has happened like say to Kevin Spacey-- he happened to be caught up in the sexual harassment wave--wave meaning wasn't he accused of making a pass at someone at a party in like 1984--all of a sudden this is a problem--a wave.
Wolfe captures the total absurdity of a wall street trader becoming caught of in a scandal involving a minority group that if showcased in the right way can be a hot ticket for the star Reverend/Man of community, for the district attorney, for a journalist needing a big break.
It is how many people feed on showcasing the hanging of an individual with media being the main propagating force.
I was worried about this novel being outdated because it was big in the 80's and wow was i wrong.
RIP MR. Wolf i have read most of his material and am excited to read the rest of his non fiction works.
This is also really funny and the most laugh out loud funny next to Back o Blood.

I picked up The Right Stuff, expecting to read a detailed history of the US space program; from the breaking of the sound barrier to the Moon landing. Instead Wolfe has written a book about the rare breed of men that have the necessary ice water coursing through their veins to fly the experimental fighter jets, and to sit on the tips of rockets. This isn't a book about the science and bureaucracy of aviation in the 50s and 60's, but instead a study of the psyche of the pilot.

This is a fast past paced narrative which portrays the pilot of the cold war as a near mythical figure - an American David to the Soviet Goliath. In doing so Wolfe also examines the psyche of the American people during this time, and provides an interesting commentary on society. It harkens back to a time when America could accomplish what was thought unthinkable, by the sheer determination and true patriotism of its people. In a way that is almost hard for us today to imagine, these pilots not for monetary gain, risked their lives for their country and for the prestige of being called a true brother among pilots. Society today has a strange way of making celebrities out of the nobodies and the untalented. Reading The Right Stuff in 2009, is a reminder that America once extolled the virtue of real accomplishment, of being chosen from the select few, and from the select few proving to have the right stuff.

As certain legal cases continue to generate huge headlines with everybody fighting for their camera close-ups, it shows that "The Bonfire of the Vanities" will never become irrelevant.

The novel is an extremely fun read that eviscerates the New York of the 80s, as well as managing to stay relevant in contemporary times. Wolfe's novel peers through the windows of all the social strata to meld an infuriating tale of people pretending to look out for the greater good but only engaging in vicious self-preservation. There aren't many characters in the book whom I found especially likeable and some who I found palatable at first ended up disappointing me. Every twist in the story made things even more unpredictable right up to the epilogue, which I found to be a bit of a let down but a realistic one. My only real question at the end of the story was the subplot about the $350,000 that the Reverend Bacon couldn't account for; Wolfe seemed to drop the ball on that and I wanted to see where it would end up.

This story was originally serialized in "Rolling Stone" magazine (!) in 1984-85 but by the time it saw print as a complete novel, it had changed quite a bit. Sherman McCoy was a writer in the serial, and was a Wall Street financier in the novel. Wolfe tapped into the temper of the times with that canny switch, and makes the putpouring of anger and resentment against McCoy that much more timely.

How did Tom Wolfe get the material for this amazing book? It is like a rocket itself, blasting into the dark blue sky on the incandescent heat of radiant language burning on pure, reactive concentration of "inside scoop." Maybe his heros and heroines didn't really think exactly the thoughts that Wolfe puts in their minds at key points in the narrative, but he makes the readers think they did, and that the moment was so vivid for them that they could quote it all backwards to him . . . even though he squeezed it into his reigning narrative conceits, his stuff about Right Stuff and cookies and the story he wants to tell . . .

I read Steven Ambrose's Band of Brothers concurrently with this book. Both are excellent works of history. Ambrose was painstaking in interviewing veterans to recreate an accurate chronicle of amazing events, and is furthermore a good writer. I also gave Ambrose's book five stars. But Wolfe is more than a chronicler or historian: he is a brilliant writer who creates literature. This may sound strange to some readers, but Wolfe's style reminds me a little of a couple Russian writers, with his interior monologues and wild metaphors that shed light as well as heat -- Fyodor Dostoevsky, and (really, a little) Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

But enough from me. Let me conclude with some quotes from this book. If they turn you off, if they bore you, well, go back to the sandlot, Charlie Brown:

"They regarded the military psychiatrist as the modern and unusually bat-brained version of the chaplain. But the shrink could be dealt with. You just turned on the charm -- lit up the halo of the right stuff -- and did some prudent lying. . . . This showed that you were a rational test pilot, as concerned about safety as any sensible professional . . . while at the same time getting across the idea that you had been routinely risking your life and were so used to it, has such righteous stuff, that riding a rocket seemed like a vacation by comparison."

"It was as iff the press in America, for all its vaunted independence, were a great colonial animal, an animal made up of countless clustered organisms responding to a single nervous system . . . the public, the populace, the citizenry, must be provided with the correct feelings!"

"As if some grim wintertime north-country Lutheran cloud of Original Sin were passing in front of his face."

"There were not going to be any astronauts with washed-up marriages in the pages of Life magazine on the eve of the battle in the heavens with the Russians."

"With soil so sandy that the scrub pines had trouble growing fifteen feet high, and yet malarial and so marshy that the cottonmouth moccasins stood their ground and stared you down, the sort of hopeless stone boondock spit where the vertebrates give up and the slugs and No See-um bugs take over."

"Like most military people . . . they didn't really consider New York part of the United States. It was like a free port, a stateless city, an international protectorate, Danzig in the Polish corridor . . . It was a foreign city full of a strange race of curiously tiny malformed grey people . . . This horrible rat-gray city was suddenly touching, warm! You wanted to protect these poor souls who loved you so mch . . . They knew it had to do with the presence, the aura, the radiation of the right stuff . . . We pay homage to you! You have fought back against the Russians in the heavens!"

This is not the history your wife remembers with boredom and loathing from Miss Marple in high school. This is history (and darn good history, it seems) with spunk -- the literary Right Stuff, indeed.

Wow. This book is still relevant some 30 years after publication. Perhaps written as a farce, this book is actually pretty depressing as it hits certain reality points dead-on. It's all a mix of decadence, race relations, and political maneuvering. What's most interesting is the theme of media manipulation. Book clubs should reach for this book. The themes still resonate in today's world. Wolfe loves his vocabulary and his message is strong.

This book, written in the 1980s about New York of the early- to mid-1980s, while not fresh, is certainly not irrelevant. Most of the character types are clearly recognizable as extant forces in the city and the nation.
The plot of the book is nothing remarkable per se. It takes a while to materialize and is mildly interesting, but nothing about it is especially clever. A bad, dumb, white guy -- rich and insensitive of course -- is screwing around on his wife with a golddigger. Through circumstances beyond his control he is involved in a seemingly minor incident that balloons up and takes over his life, making it, and him, into something very different, (and, we presume, better) than it, and he, was before. Along the way, some good guys pop up, some bad guys pop up, and some guys you thought were good but turn out to be bad pop up.
Wolfe does a good job in getting into his characters' minds and letting us in on what they're thinking and feeling along the way. Wolfe's writing gets in the way of the story, however. He is overly descriptive of the surroundings to the point that one soon tires it -- at least I did. It came to the point that I skipped over entire paragraphs devoted to descriptions of furniture and wall hangings.
Some of the more memorable parts of the book involve the parties the rich white guy and his wife attend, with hilarious, almost Vonnegut-like descriptions of the attendees' laughs. Wolfe also does his readers a service for a look inside the fourth estate. To those of us who think the news media have a particular axe to grind it is enlightening to see them cast as mere grubbers, each after his or her own moment of fame. (A phrase from another book -- The Martian Race by Gregory Benford -- comes to mind -- "the snout of the media pig had worked its way under the tent...")
It is amusing to think that many of the events so central to the plot are now meaningless due to technology - cell and satellite phones, the Internet and cable news, and the widespread availability of credit cards, to name a few. All in all though, this is not a bad book. It is overly long and tedious in spots, but it's worth reading if for no other reason than it provides a look back into the marvelous '80s, and a reminder that human nature never changes.

Outstanding! The story at first seems to meander, but even Wolfe's seemingly innocuous first 3 chapters serve their purpose. Sherman McCoy is such a completely self-centered, sheltered, wealthy individual that the mere sight of a young black male in his posh Manhattan neighborhood practically gives him a panic attack. Wolfe also skillfully shows how the sophisticated, Yale-educated stockbroker Sherman is reduced to a hormone-ridden high-school boy at the prospect of a secret rendezvous with his sexy, desirable young mistress, Maria. His bumbling phone call to his wife Judy prepares us for exactly how poorly he will be prepared to handle any events that deviate even slightly from his closed, insular life. The other 3 main characters are just as sharply drawn. Larry Kramer is the poor man's Sherman McCoy. Just as Sherman risks everything he has, including his marriage, for a woman he lusts over, Kramer does the same, risking the opportunity of a lifetime to act out on his! ! unfulfilled fantasies of "the girl with the brown lipstick". Reverend Bacon, an obvious parody of Al Sharpton, is shown in all of his self-righteous posturing and slick insincerity (his motivations in "helping victims" are less than pure). Peter Fallow, the British tabloid "journalist", is a first-rate opportunist who uses other people's tragedies to save his flagging career (he's desperate to get the "Big Story", truth be damned, since he's about to be fired for his habitual drunkenness). His snobbery about the crude "Yanks" provide a lot of the humor; as much as he reviles Americans, he is not averse to mooching dinners and drinks from them. One of the funniest chapters consists of his dinner with Maria's tycoon husband. The finest creation of the secondary characters is Myron "Mike" Kovitsky, the no-nonsense judge who won't buckle under to the pressures of popular demand. His manner in dealing with the caged crimi! ! nals, for instance, is a classic: he gets down to their lev! el of cat-calling in his own unique, vulgar way. This stubborn trait never changes throughout the novel; he is perhaps the only truly noble character to be found. I wish there had been more memorable female characters; as it is, Maria is the only stand-out among the "social X-rays and lemon tarts", including Judy McCoy (I would have liked to see her character expanded). Predictably, Maria plays a large part in the resulting comic tragedy and shows herself to be completely self-centered, utterly without a conscience and purely carnal in her instincts. Maria, not the sterotypical fragile Southern belle she at first appears to be, is not easily intimidated and proves to be much more of a ruthless cut-throat than Sherman the Scheming Stockbroker, who soon falls apart at work as well as in his personal life. The satire is first-rate, although some of the "privileged party" scenes are occasionally dragged out too long. Wolfe shows that there is no limit or except! ! ions to greed and opportunism in any class line, from the blacks in the Bronx to the WASP-y Manhattan socialites to the British tabloid "sleaze journalists". Some people have suggested that the epilogue was a cop-out; I happened to like it, because it provided a bit of realism to the satire. Especially observe how Sherman, as an accused criminal, is the toast of Manhattan, and after his trial, appears to have been deserted.

This is a great book about a prominent Wall Street financier who has the misfortune of becoming a political football after he is involved in a hit and run accident on a black youth in the Bronx. Wolfe once again captures all of his characters perfectly - all the idiosyncracies are there. How do I know this? Because we see ourselves in these characters. We think many of the same thoughts and only when reading Wolfe do we say, "yeah, that's how I am too" which may be a humbling experience.

While an interesting plot in its own right, Bonfire of the Vanities is also a piercing commentary on race relations, class relations, and human relations. Wolfe has an uncanny way of getting into each characters head and the reader cannot help but empathize with each one.

This is Wolfe's first fictional work and widely considered his best fiction (of only three though). I have also read I Am Charlotte Simmons and I would argue that Bonfire is not quite as good as Wolfe's novel about a small town girl in prestigious university. Since I have never been to New York City etc I could not connect quite as well with the characters as I could in Charlotte Simmons which was an eerily accurate portrayal of collegiate life.

It's obvious that this book takes place in the 80's. What with the 80's wall street narcissism, the abundance of shoulder pads, the European opulence in decorating styles of the elite, the computer screens with "green" writing, the use of pay phones, the idea that brown lipstick could ever be remotely sexy. Yet despite all this, the book still feels incredibly relevant in today's times. Actually even more relevant as America wakes up to a crisis of confidence in Wall Street.

Almost all characters in this book are contemptible, save for maybe the Lamb kid (although even his wholesome personae is overblown), the little daughter, and the defense lawyer. Yet none of these people are the stars of the book. The real players: Sherman, Bacon, Kramer, and Fallow are incredibly smarmy in their respective fields. You can't root for any of them. Did you want Sherman to win his case or not? Wolfe clearly had a real disdain for these characters and so too did I. But I kind of liked this. I couldn't root for anyone and it kept me on my literary toes.

The only observation that kept running through my head while reading this book was that Bacon, Kramer, and Fallow all had to metaphorically or actually tear down alpha male Sherman in order to feel better about themselves. To that end, I think this book is just as much about American male egotism as it is about anything else.

All in all, a great, worthwhile read (and BTW, the first Wolfe I have ever read; I might have to venture further into his collection).

Beginning this novel, I knew its reputation and its basic plot, but right off I feared I would despise this novel because of the horrible things that Sherman McCoy puts his wife Judy and daughter Campbell through.

This novel is really about characters, primarly McCoy and to a lesser degree Larry Kramer, the DA. Yet Wolfe also devotes large chunks to Peter Fallow, the tabloid drunk journalist, and Reverand Bacon, the scheming civil rights leader.

As the novel opens, McCoy is a selfish louse who views himself as a Master of the Universe in his position as a bond salesman. He also is cheating on his wife and lusts after other moms at his daughter's bus stop. McCoy is a bad man. But circumstances take over and other people, acting realistically, (like Kramer the DA and Fallow the journalist) and in their own self-interests begin to do things that on the surface are right, but end up attacking McCoy's sheltered life.

As the novel progresses, McCoy became a more sympathetic man. One reviewer said they felt cheated because McCoy never changed until the final 2 pages and it would have been much better if he had changed some during the course of the novel. But I think McCoy began to change the moment he spent a few hours in jail. At that time, he needed Judy to be with him and tried to reach out to her, but his behavior previously had kept her from being supportive of him. Campbell was also affected by McCoy but not permanently.

In this character driven novel, there aren't good guys or bad guys, just normal people acting selfishly and predictably and these situations ultimately force Sherman Mccoy to realize what is important in life before it is too late.

Even taken at face value, this is a great novel, engaging to the point that it can be hard to put down.

Some editorial reviews characterize this as a comedy (e.g., “funny,” “human comedy,” “high comedy,”), an interpretation reflected in the movie version, which portrays the story in a more obviously ridiculous way. Although the story is entertaining in the way that a good story should be, I didn’t find it particularly funny, even though circumstances do conspire in a book-like way to ensure that all the things that can go wrong on a given day seem to actually do so.

Editorial reviewers also labeled this “modern American satire.” While this may (just barely) have been accurate in 1987 when the book was written, it is only subtle satire at best in 2018, as the book is probably far closer to reality than most reviewers would like to admit. Many of the people who write those reviews hail from New York (e.g., New York Times Book Review), and nibble at the edges of those exact social circles, don't see themselves the way everyone outside that bubble does. They cannot get far enough outside themselves to see it, and it makes them feel better about themselves to be able to regard this as “satire.” For the Wall Street types, no more need be said--we have come to the point in 2018 where nothing is too hard to believe.

It is interesting to read this 30 years after it was written and see how close to the mark the author was in spotting a few societal trends (as it turns out). His frank descriptions of race relations, the prison system, the culture in the financial industry, and the insularity of big city New York high society all seem right on the mark. Discouragingly, none of these seem to have improved over time, and are trending in the wrong direction. The main character, Sherman McCoy, nods acknowledgement to this at one or two points by daydreaming about making a move to Knoxville where he can lead a simpler, less high-octane existence.

This is my second Tom Wolfe fiction novel, the other being “A Man in Full” that I read years ago. Although that one is not about New York, it is easy to see the formula Mr. Wolfe uses to write his stories. He sets up five or six narrative threads about seemingly unrelated people early in his novel, to introduce the characters and getting readers wondering how all of these disparate narratives and circumstances can possibly be related. Once this is done, the weaving of his tapestry begins and the core of the tale unfolds. At the end of the novel, one main character is completely transformed by his experiences. This formula is followed faithfully in both books.

This is not to say that the book is predictable—far from it. Part of what keeps readers engaged is the constant speculation about what is going to happen next. A number of surprises are sprinkled throughout the story, keeping readers guessing. Great storytelling, highly recommended.

Author Tom Wolfe, writes like he wears a thesaurus as his crown! His book was born from basic curiosity; why would any man want to be strapped inside a tiny tin can of a rocket ship, to be blasted into the heavens by a massive rocket? It was more dangerous than anything ever attempted in human history, so what sort of person would willingly put his butt on the line for this cause? Tom Wolfe tells the story about how the space program was conceptualized, experimented and developed; concentrating on the Mercury Era and how these discoveries built upon our successful US moon landing.. Alot of the stories I've read before, and some I have read for the first time in this interesting and well-written book, which is non-fiction. It's the story of modern rocketry, beginning with the bravest of all men who did not get a college degree; Chuck Yeager. He was a totally natural aviator and when he broke the sound barrier, yet there was no ticker tape parades held to honor Yeager. Nothing. It was classified information for years and years, back when Edwards Air Force Base was called Muroc. Those were some exciting days of aviation and discovery of how fast man could fly, and how far he could stretch the edges of the envelope of modern military aircraft.
Mercury astronauts were pilots and most served in different branches of the military; all having college degrees as a requirement for consideration.
The Mercury program and the flying aces who carried out the world's most dangerous missions was discussed in this book with great explanation. Alan Sheperd was the first astronaut to be blasted up into space; and with all the technical and complicated machinery used, all the scientists, engineers flight surgeons and nurses never considered that the poor man would need to relieve his urinary bladder while he was perched for four hours in the space capsule. His mission was a great success, but he had to wet himself before launch, which was kept a national secret for decades!
Second launched was Gus Grissom, but he sunk his own battleship, and brought wide-spread consternation upon himself. His Mercury capsule sunk when he accidentally blew his hatch prematurely, and he nearly drowned while waiting egress. Why NASA didn't fire Grissom remains a mystery to me. Grissom had a fierce case of bad luck and it followed him till his dying day, which came prematurely. Then came the lucky, golden boy, John Glen. The world was brought to their knees by the heroic actions and the goodness of John Glen. His perfect rocket orbit around Earth and perfect splash-down, right on target in the Atlantic Ocean caught the world's attention by storm. John Glen was the most famous of the fantastic Seven. People could not get enough of John Glen, and he could do no wrong. The other four astronauts stories was told in this exciting book, but truth be told, it is Mr. Wolfe's exceptional writing that made these men so famous and legendary.
Scott Kelly exalts this book - The Right Stuff, in his recently published memoir titled, Endurance. Scott Kelly credits Tom Wolfe for inspiring him to becoming a US astronaut, and he is very adamant that he, Scott Kelly, would never have amounted to anything - had he not read this book for the first time when he was just 18 years old.
I have to give credit where credit is due. This book was copywrite published in 1979, but it still packs a wallop. Please read it and enjoy the descriptive prose of our hero, Tom Wolfe. Thank you.

The Right Stuff is a facinating and accurate depiction of the saga of the Mercury astronauts. Tom Wolfe really does a wonderful job of making both an interesting factual presentation of history as well as a colorful portrayal of the lives of those directly involved. The stress on the wives of the pilots for example gives one the untainted look at these incredible ladies composure and character that is seldon captured in other historical novels. The astronauts and pilots themselves who were regarded as more than human by the press of the period, are also portrayed very artfully in this often candid expose' on their often carefree regard for the dangerous jobs they constantly undertook. These men and women truly had the `Right Stuff' at a very unpredictable period in US history: the dawn of the space race. High pressure situations continually kept all those involved on constant edge. This book carries you from the testing flight testing years at Edwards airforce base where Yeager is the king, through the Sputnik challenge and the American failed rocket testing early on, and finally arriving at the eventual successful space flights themselves. Throughout the book is the ongoing weave of eager and relentless reporters, a clamoring nation of people demanding immediate success, as well as the political pressure through three presidential administrations all piled on the shoulders of those connected with the program. The pressure cooker builds as the story progresses, and the explosion of success takes everyone involved by surprise including the astronauts themselves. This is an incredibly unique period in US history depicting the first astronauts who were idolized in a time when the nation truly needed heroes for its own personal pride. These men restored patriotism at a time when the feeling was considered lost. Additionally Wolfe covers the early years of the space programs development, including the Air Forces success with the X-15 project which was over-shadowed by the popularity of the Mercury program. The Mercury program's success sparked the later Apollo and Gemini programs almost immediately after the first flight with Alan Shepard. The sudden success of the NASA space program created a silent upheaval in the national brotherhood of pilots that is brilliantly detailed by the author giving a a full picture to the reader. One really gets the full practical viewpoint and daredevil gallantry of the test pilots in this book that is seldom touched elsewhere. In addition to that the author describes the beginning of the space program and the early positioning of power within that reveals an almost complete upheaval at times by its early architects (scientists, engineers, pilots, and all) and finally settling into a sensable orderly structure in the later years. This book truly sheds light on the early years of the NASA space program and gives one the candid look behind all the fanfare showing what really was happening outside of the public eye. Tom Wolfe completes a very tasteful coverage of the lives of the people involved and the evolution of the exploration of the new frontier with this exciting work. I found the later movie that followed the book to be very much in keeping, however there are many details that are left out of the movie that are covered in the book. This alone makes it a must to read. parts of the story that were unable to make it to the big screen was the flight of Wally Shirra and Scott Carpenter. These two flights alone had a great deal to do with setting the future direction of the space program. This is one you will enjoy as it will capture you interest from the beginning and leave you with a sense of national pride at the bravery and true pioneer spirit of all the people involved. You will be amazed as I was at the out-pouring of affection these men generated on America during this period. A stunning portrayal of a unique period in American history. All in all a great book to read and enjoy. I am very grateful to Tom Wolfe for having written such a novel, as this was a story that needed to be told.

As to just what this ineffable quality was. . .well, it obviously involved bravery. But it was not bravery in the simple sense of being willing to risk your life. . .any fool could do that. . . . No, the idea. . .seemed to be that a man should have the ability to go up in a hurtling piece of machinery and put his hide on the line and then have the moxie, the reflexes, the experience, the coolness, to pull it back in the last yawning moment--and then to go up again the next day, and the next day, and every next day. . . . There was a seemingly infinite series of tests. . .a dizzy progression of steps and ledges. . .a pyramid extraordinarily high and steep; and the idea was to prove at every foot of the way up that pyramid that you were one of the elected and anointed ones who had the right stuff and could move higher and higher and even--ultimately, God willing, one day--that you might be able to join that special few at the very top, that elite who had the capacity to bring tears to men's eyes, the very Brotherhood of the Right Stuff itself. -Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff
I don't know whether Tom Wolfe invented New Journalism or merely noticed that it was aborning, even he would probably credit Truman Capote's In Cold Blood, but he's certainly one of the greatest practitioners and The Right Stuff one of his greatest achievements. The essence of this "new" writing style was that non-fiction writers would write with a distinct authorial voice and would utilize the techniques of the novel. Most importantly, rather than having the story exist solely to convey facts, the facts were to serve the story. This allowed the writer some license to play with reality a little, as long as the story remained "true" and it allowed the writer to aim for telling big truths, those which would frequently lie beyond the perspective of a conventional story.
All of these innovations are brilliantly on display here. Every paragraph of the book reeks of Tom Wolfe, from the capitalization of certain concepts (it not just the right stuff, it's The Right Stuff) to the snarky jabs at myriad puffed up targets. By using the structure of a novel, he gives the story a conceptual coherence that straight reportage might not have offered--thus, he starts with Yeager and the first supersonic jets, then presents the story of the Mercury program, then returns to Yeager and the end of the effort to build jets that would actually have traveled into space. All of this seems uniquely suited to satire or parody or simply viscious attack, indeed, Wolfe has used the stylistic conventions of New Journalism for just these purposes in books like "Radical Chic" and "Bauhaus to Our House" to brilliant effect. But an interesting thing happens in The Right Stuff. Even though we hear that snide voice trying to speak out periodically, Wolfe is so smitten by the jet pilots and astronauts and their wives that he writes about, that these devices are turned on their collective head and they become the accouterments of a kind of conscious, but unabashed, myth making.
In the end, the book becomes a sort of American Ring of the Nibelungen or Iliad. I remember when Philip Kaufman's movie version came out, people were a little disconcerted by the stylized story-telling, but it seemed to me that he had handled the material exactly right, like the libretto for a Grand Opera. As a newish country and a fairly secular one, we don't have many myths or fables (with the notable exception of the Western), but what Tom Wolfe serves up here, is a quintessential American epic, complete with archetypes and leitmotifs and the lot. By looking back at the "real" events through the lens of his book, we can actually penetrate to truths about our culture and our national character that would not have been apparent in a straightforward history of the Space Program.
This is a great book and Wolfe is one of our greatest writers.
GRADE: A+

Regarded by some as the essential literary representation of 1980s America, "Bonfire of the Vanities" was written during the economic boom and urban crime waves of that decade and published almost as the stock market crashed in 1987. It follows the lives of a group of characters who express New York City's ethnic, socio-economic, and political rivalries through their involvement in a highly-publicized case of hit-and-run. A car belonging to Sherman McCoy of Park Avenue, one of Wall Street's most successful bond brokers, accidentally strikes a young black man in the Bronx. With the injured man in a coma, Harlem preacher, politician, and general rabble-rouser Rev. Reginald Bacon sees an opportunity to advance his agenda -by delivering the racially charged case to ambitious District Attorney Abe Weiss and to unscrupulous tabloid journalist Peter Fallow. Prosecutor Lawrence Kramer jumps at the opportunity to bring down a wealthy WASP in the name of equality. And streetwise Irish lawyer Tommy Killian may be McCoy's only ally in a city where truth and justice take a back seat to just about everything.

"Bonfire of the Vanities"' flaw is ironically the source of its strength. The book is over 600 pages long. It follows too many characters and spends a lot of time describing the world from their point of view. The book's insights rely on its many perspectives, but at the same time, the descriptions are cumbersome. Tom Wolfe generally does not cast his characters in sympathetic light. His willingness to call it how they see it draws the reader into the story out of an almost perverse curiosity. The blunt talk and peek inside the worlds of city politics, tabloid journalism, criminal law, and Park Avenue lifestyles keep us interested. The story is found in the self-serving hostilities and interdependencies of New York's many factions more than it is in the sequence of events. And it's all thoroughly plausible, sadly.

This non-fiction tells more than the story of America's race for space - but actually tells a deeper story: of America's push into the next frontier and how it discarded the heroes and heroism that led the way. Beginning with the early years of the jet age - when jets were prone to disintegrate at transonic speeds if they didn't just fail, Wolfe charts the conquest of the sonic barrier by Chuck Yeager. When the Russians jump the gun and pioneer the artificial satellite (and the nuclear-capable ICBM that lofted it into orbit) the US responds with its own programs - which fail miserably. The triumph of Gagarin's and Leonov's space flights spur the Americans to use unproven and flimsy hardware, and respond with apparently less success. (Unlike the first Soviet space flights which achieved orbit, the first American astronauts flew short suborbital missions; though superior technology allowed the west to loft satellites comparable to Sputnik but much smaller, conventional wisdom held the grapefruit-sized satellites as inferior). Though military test pilots had been flying (and dying) in virtual anonymity for years, those chosen to fly the American rockets become national heroes before the first launch. Wolfe parallels the civilian Mercury program that lofted the first Astronauts with the exotic but military X-15 program (which did not reach as high or as fast, but was at least flown by a pilot like an airplane) as if paralleling a more promising program with one that people were more interested in. The distinction is between the heroism that the Mercury astronauts stood for, and the heroism X-15 pilots (who snapped up no book deals) actually embodied.
"The Right Stuff" is a triumph. Though it doesn't tell the whole story of the space program, Wolfe sets up an ingenious theme. The pilots and astronauts of the day were heroes, like knights of the round table, and the cold war was there crusade. While this sense of the epic was an outgrowth of the end of WWII, the burgeoning missile and nuclear technologies meant it would soon become impossible to see the world in simplistic terms. Though technology improved, those who developed or relied on it matured as well, shedding their addiction to the epic - John Glenn (whom Wolfe paints as a sincere hero) clashes with NASA bigwigs and never flies again (until the late 1990's), while Chuck Yeager assumes command of test pilot school, only to confront Kennedy-era political correctness. The book ends on a bittersweet note - with Mercury giving way to Gemini, and the end of the X-15. Wolfe describes these events and others as hallmarks of the cold-war's end. No longer would American's fly in space solo like warriors of old, while the demise of the X-15 eliminated American warriors from spaceflight entirely. Paralleling this were the Cuban missile crisis and the DC-Kremlin hotline. There would still be a cold war but, divorced from its epic delusions, we would learn how to end it...eventually. So profound was this change in mentality that, JFK's assassination at the crosshairs of a pro-Castro militant did not raise red-scare hsyteria.
"The Right Stuff" also triumphs because of its unique perspective of the time which seems to parrot the hysteria of the day without actually condescending to it. Through the book we see the world marvel at the illusion of Russian ingenuity ("imagine, they kept a man alive up there a whole day!") while remaining fatalistic about American blunders ("our boys always screw up!" "Our rockets always explode!!") Wolfe inspired a new school of journalism and history, but none have come close to matching this feat.

First off, let me say that this book really held my interest and I enjoyed it (I gave it four stars, didn't I?).
Perhaps, though, I should not have read "A Man in Full" first. There are so many similarities between the two books that I found myself thinking that Wolfe re-wrote "Bonfire" to make "Man," yet based it in Atlanta instead of New York.
Let's see...both books had racial tensions, both concerned lawyers that only looked out for their own interests, both had a strong main character that eventually fell in the end, both involved a lot (and I do mean a lot) of spouse-cheating, both had political figures that were determined to get re-elected at any cost, both had characters that were oh-so-concerned with thrusting out their mighty muscles to impress the women...etc. etc. etc.
A previous reviewer stated that she didn't understand why people did not like the protagonist, Sherman McCoy. Let's see...hmmm...he cheats on his wife, repeatedly...he's a jerk to his fellow co-workers...he has no thought to what the consequences of his actions could do to his young daughter...in short, he generally thinks with the, er, "contents" of his pants. Granted, Wolfe writes in such a way that you do feel sorry for Sherman at the end, but I think it's important to remember that if he hadn't been cheating on his wife with Maria, then he never would have hit anyone with his car and the whole situation would have been avoided (although granted that would have made for a much less interesting book).
All in all, though, even if "Man" and "Bonfire" are similar, one cannot overlook the original genious of "Bonfire." Wolfe's descriptives of different types of people (the "Pimp Roll," for God's sake, to describe how someone walked) and the vicious observations he makes on society and its shortcomings (and believe me, no one is exempt, not even authors) aid in the creation of an intricately woven piece of literature.

No one is likable and everyone is out for themselves in this book ... captures the 1980's to perfection. So many elements of the 1980's are captured in this book, but the greatest feature is ego unchecked. From the opening scene where the mayor gets hit by a half-eaten jar of mayonnaise and all he could think of was, "who would bring a half-eaten jar of mayonnaise to a public rally," to lawyers vainly feeling their muscles in the "tricep-ich," this book pulsates with the blood of the 80's. Sherman McCoy - a WASP junk bond salesman, accidentally hits a black youth that was talked into trying to rob him in the Bronx. The narration is omnipresent which makes this book the power that it is. Wolfe acts as if God Almighty is writing this book and passing judgment all along the route. He has plenty of material to work with as the cast grows with each page. The ending is characteristic of Wolfe's work and the 80's. Of all I read of Wolfe (and he is a great author) this is his finest work. No single bit of work has captured with satire one era more successfully than "Bonfire."

The first thing that struck me, after reading a synopsis of Bonfire, is that its impetus is similar to the climax of The Great Gatsby. Given this connection, we can look at these two novels in the context in which they are written. The Great Gatsby is considered by some to be "the great American novel," trying to encapsulate a time in the country's history. Jay Gatsby creates a wealthy identity for himself, appearing out of nowhere to claim his love, Daisy. Vehicular manslaugther ends their love. Sherman McCoy, in contrast, is born wealthy. Vehicular manslaughter ends his fun, which I hesitate to call love. Lust is probably more appropriate. This is only the beginning of the novel, and we watch his entire downfall unfold. So the two main contrasting ideas are what Jay and Sherman's motivations are (love versus lust) and what the focus of their lives in the novels are (love versus downfall). These are important things to think about when reading these novels and considering what each author might be trying to say about the period they are writing in. I also want to comment briefly on a few reasons some readers really dislike this novel. First, none of the main characters are admirable. There is definetly no one to latch on to as a moral center. Don't read on in hope of finding someone, but do read on anyway. Second, the entire society we are viewing is corrupt. There is no way to place blame on any single person or group in the novel. Be careful while reading and I hope that at the end, you are satisfied that everyone is equally at fault. I don't think Wolfe intended for his novel to place blame.

I have seen so many passing references to Tom Wolfe's first novel, Bonfire of the Vanities, as a modern classic, that I thought I should finally read it (I never saw the movie either); yet, I was worried that, in the 24 years since its publication, it might have become dated and irrelevant. I had no need to worry. The New York City and Wall Street of the 1980s has not changed much and with the focus of the 2008 great recession as a new point of reference, Bonfire of the Vanities has an immediacy that belies the passing of a quarter of a century. The characters and the situations related in the novel are contemporary, and above all, the book tells a very, very good, indeed exciting, story. It is easy to predict that Bonfire of the Vanities will remain in print indefinitely and will continue to be read by readers like me, who value good and pleasurable writing, centered around plausible and relevant plots. I now plan to watch the 1990 movie adaptation starring Tom Hanks.

Probably my favorite novel ever. The story and the sub-plots are original and define NYC c. 1987; this book will be cited for decades. Wolfe's narrative is incredible;sometimes stunning, sometimes laugh out loud funny. The movie was a disaster, of course, but you cannot possibly translate Wolfe's dialogue and descriptive powers into film. Brian DePalma couldn't, at least.

I occasionally pick this up and read 10-15 minutes of it, starting anywhere, just for fun, and marvel at it. I keep a copy on the car in case I get stuck somewhere. I cannot recommend this book any higher. God save Tom Wolfe.

Perhaps the thing that struck me most about this novel was the fact that even if it was a "period" piece of the 1980s, it was shockingly similar to the society of the turn of the 21st century, right before the tech-bubble burst. In 20 years, it amazes me how much--and at the same time how *little*--has really changed. One might almost expect Sherman McCoy to pull out a miniaturized cell phone to bid on some shares of Enron rather than the Giscard bonds he was involved with. I felt, reading this book for the first time in the 21st century, that it might as well be the society of today under Mr. Wolfe's satirical scrutiny.
The racially, politically charged media circus surrounding his arrest is perhaps now an even more familiar phenomenon than it would have been in the 1980s--something to which we as a society are becoming increasingly numb to. As the situation grows, and spirals further out of control, Mr. Wolfe makes it increasingly harder on the reader to land squarely on one side or another--on one hand we have the unjust death of a promising Bronx student, and on the other, we have the case being used by various people trying to further their public careers. One even begins to feel sympathy for the calculating, womanizing Sherman McCoy as his perfectly ordered life comes completely unraveled. And then we as readers become repulsed by such feelings--which is truly the "right" feeling in a situation like this? There is no black or white here (yes, that remark is meant on many levels)--only a confusing, boundless field of grey. And that seems to be at the core of Mr. Wolfe's purpose in writing this...it is an unflinching look at a society that seems to verge upon the completely amoral.
With regards to its "unflinching" nature, some readers may at first be put off by the extreme bluntness with which Mr. Wolfe tells his story. Epithets and "outdated" social and cultural attitudes abound, and Mr. Wolfe doesn't shy away from the harshest, ugliest possible terms for them. And this very bluntness is perhaps what makes The Bonfire of the Vanities so compelling to me as a reader. We live in a society that has smothered itself by political correctness--a society where despite seeming openness, the lines of communication are really quite tightly controlled by that strange convention. To see the veneer of civilization completely ripped away from the society of the 1980s (and, one might imagine, from the very society in which we live now) is at once a repulsive and refreshing experience-- this is perhaps one of the best modern novels I have ever read, fully deserving of its 5 stars.

I ended up reading Bonfire after reading "Man in Full" and "I am Charlotte Simmons." All three have a similar style and feel about them. I thoroughly enjoyed all three, including Bonfire. The difference in Bonfire is that at first I didn't care for any of the characters. In fact, all the main characters leave a bad taste in your mouth. Later, as the plot unfolds, some of those feelings change. It is a tribute to the author's excellent writing and grasp of human nature that even though I disliked the characters, I was drawn to them and their story. Its like a New York version of a Greek tragedy except it unfolds over the course of a majority of the book. The characters seem real--the story seems real and you end up rooting for the protagonist despite his many flaws. This is the Great American Novel--the kind that is rarely written these days. Bonfire is a book that will continue to be read 100 years from now--a modern classic. Highly recommended.

Tom Wolfe's book, The Right Stuff, is, at minimum a well written chronicle of the Mercury Program in the early days of space flight in the US. Additionally, it adds a perspective you would not find in other historical documents. It effectively weaves the fears, joys, rivalries -- essentially the emotional impact of the era -- on the men who flew the space missions and the families who waited behind, and how they all endured the scrutiny of the press and public.

Tom Wolfe captures the essence of big-city racial and class conflict, plus greed, ambition, and self-serving hypocrites. His story concerns high-living banker Sherman McCoy, whose accidental exit from the New York freeway into the crime-plagued South Bronx leads to his mistress running over a young black man (who may have been looking to rob McCoy). Enter a questionable black leader, an unscrupulous vote-seeking district attorney, and a sleazy tabloid reporter, each of whom seeks to manipulate and play off events for their own aggrandizement. The story has few admirable characters at any level, not in the Park Avenue mansions, the courts, nor the tough streets. Equally lacking are social codes of decency and honesty. The story covers New York in the mid-1980's but one senses it applies today as well.

Wolfe provides a powerful tale, one with some parallels to the Tawana Brawley hoax that occurred not long after this book arrived. The book drags a bit in a couple places (thus four stars and not five), but Wolfe provides a powerful message.

The much-celebrated novel is a fairly unique one in the landscape of literature. Its 700+ pages and style are, as explicitly stated by Wolfe in the intro, an attempt to return to the grander realism works of the past. He specifically mentions Anna Karenina as the great example of the novel that portrays a cross section of a whole society. Only this is rarely done today, so what we have is one of the only major cross-sections of New York in the 80's.
However, this is a cross-section that is viciously sliced from the meaty flesh of New York society, leaving it gaping, bleeding and exposed, all in a highly satirical and humorous way.
The main story revolves around a high-powered broker and his mistress who are involved in a hit-and-run accident which leaves a young, black "youth" from the Bronx in a coma. The scandal sweeps the city as an epitomy of the racial, economic and cultural differences (and inequalities), as a mob builds up around the case. In terms of the actual plot, there's nothing complicated, rather, its the eye into the eschelons of high, middle and poor society New-York-style that makes this entertaining and enjoyable.
Wolfe exposes the massive slab of hypocrisy present in the society, from the DA who has idealistic tirades about his job (when it's really a vehicle for his extra-marital and political ambitions) to the British journalist who thumbs his nose down on all things American (while scurrying for his next free meal and alcoholic binge).
As mentioned by many reviewers, there's nothing essentially new in the book - as Wolfe said, some of it feels like it's been ripped from the headlines, but in reality much of it is art imitating life. What I liked about the book is its message of vanity and indulgence, and how quickly those superficial bubbles can be burst in a crisis to *make* a person "ordinary" again. True to an almost century-old tradition in books, there are no real heroes here. But still, despite all the horrible things the main character has done, I found myself feeling sorry for him and somewhat admiring him by the end.
Other complaints have been the superficial role of women in the book, but again, I think that's simply an extension of the superficiality of a section of society that spends more on a painting frame than a cop earns in 6 months.
Overall, a great book that speaks without being preachy and has a lot of very funny moments.

Who is the true hero of the American space-race? Is it an astronaut that started in the space program? Or perhaps a man that we think of as 'a boy behind the rudder of America's self-esteem?' If you think you know, then you might be surprised by this book.
The story is that of the development of the space program that eventually becomes NASA. It is told in such a unique style and quasi hum-haw way that it keeps the reader gripping the pages and saying, "Holy Mackin-oly son. This is tense!"
But I bet if an english teacher ever picked up this book they'd cringe (i.e. 'and the pilots soared and came back down to earth in a charred ball and the rest of the pilots brought out their blue dress suits and went to the funeral and sighed.)
But hey! This is entertainment...mixed with a some serious history. So the level of enjoyment for the reader is up there. I read the book in three days and laughed, cried or did both multiple times.
I think what made the book interesting was the fact that it was basically told from the perspective of one of the astronaut's wives. Basically, but no wholely.
And who do you think the true hero is in this story? Alan Shepard? Neil Armstrong? Buzz Aldrin? How about another astronaut? Or could it possibly be a man who's never been in space but has directed some of the best pilots in the world and has done incredible feats with those sound busting rockets strapped to his behind. Could it be, Chuck Yeager? Naw! It couldn't be, could it? Read the book!

Bonfire of the Vanities is a long book and a good story by celebrated author Thomas Wolfe. I read a review of the book below and am wondering it it contained too much information and might have spoiled the ending, because right now I'm only halfway through the book. So far, the sense I get is that there are no good guys or bad guys, but there is right and wrong and each character spends time flirting with both sides. Sherman McCoy is a man who has all the trappings of success but his little empire is threatening to crumble becasue of his mounting debt, his affairs, and oh ya, a little hit and run accident that he should have reported to the police but didn't. McCoy, as a character, doesn't have many redeeming qualities. However, as political and cultural forces slowly unite to turn against him, I find myself rooting for him to stand up for all that is bad in society: the tabloid press, the Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton types that don't really care about the truth and the district attorneys looking for politcal gain.

Wolfe covers every aspect of this hit run, from its innocent beginnings to the outlandish policical case that it will turn into. Now 2/3rds of the way book, it seems Wolfe holds none of the characters in too much regard. Everyone from the victim, the accuser, the lawyers and the press are pandering to their weakest traits. I think that's where the title of the book comes from. What happens when you throw a bunch of people looking out only for themselves into one volitile situation. You get this book.

Having now finished the book, I see why it is considered a classic. Wolfe tells a great story. Sherman McCoy is a bad man, motivated by money and seduced by younger women. But when he gets involved in the accident, he slowly begins to change. He is almost forced to change because all the other people involved in his life are worse than he is. Yet they aren't behaving badly. Wolfe just portrays these people for who they are. Kramer is the district attorney who seizes the case against McCoy as a way to make a better life for himself. He does what anyone else in the situation would do. Reverend Bacon is typical of the race mongering civil rights activistis who put themselves above those they supposedly serve. Peter Fallow is a journalist who would be nuts to refuse to cover a story that is given to him.

I recommend this book because it points what can happen when selfishness overtakes people's lives. And it is an entertaining story that shows what happens when liberal politicians put their own success ahead of the truth.

This is probably *the* book of the 1980s - it explores the fragile, false world of Wall Street and Manhattan society with witty, cruel glee.
A one-off freak accident lands Sherman McCoy in a world of trouble. McCoy switches from a life of unquestioned privilege and superiority, to fear and questioning when the facts and evidence come together to point the finger at him for a hit and run.
Wolfe shows his brilliance as a writer with this book - his characters manage to be embodiments of stereotypes and complicated individuals at the same time. The reader feels sorry for un-likable characters. Little details build up - for example the male characters preening and deporting themselves in ways they think make them look strong, powerful and handsome, only when we are given another point of view we see that they just look silly and vain - the vanities of this book are many and varied (Savonarola, he of the original bonfire of the vanities, would probably be happy with the comeuppances this book provides).
Ultimately, this book is a modern classic because it manages to successfully combine all the elements - explorations of society, equality and motivation that still manages to be a great story; sparkling and witty prose that is never really flippant. It is a book that makes you think and manages to entertain at the same time.
It took me a long time to track down a copy of this book, but it was worth it - Sherman McCoy, his friends (so called), adversaries, and everyone in between, make a fascinating morality tale with a moral that manages to be blindingly clear and ambiguous at the same time.

Tom Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities" was first published in 1987, but 16 years later it is still the best parody of the political and social scene in New York City. Combining his everyday, "fly-over country"-style conservatism with his keen wit, Wolfe lays out a story that sends characters crashing into one another from all socioeconomic levels across the Big Apple.
Sherman McCoy, a stereotypical, ego-maniacal bond-trader, is Wolfe's typical protagonist. The main plot starts when McCoy and his mistress, Maria Ruskin, take a wrong turn returning from Kennedy airport one night, leaving them lost in a bad neighborhood in the Bronx. This is where they cross paths with Henry Lamb, a seemingly innocent kid stuck in a sad world, and Roland Auburn, a neighbor of Lamb's and local drug-dealing hoodlum. In their haste to escape from a neigborhood within their city but light years from anything they recognize, Sherman and Maria strike Lamb with their car, critically injuring him. Once a struggling NYC journalist learns of the story, it becomes a perfect case for the politicians, media, and attorneys to latch on to for their own selfish gain. From there the Lamb case blows up into an ordeal beyond anyone's control, but one that could only descend into such madness in New York.
Wolfe's writing is funny, entertaining, and searing. Through his fictional characters, he presents the perfect condemnation of the ridiculous excesses found in some NYC political and social circles, with specific real-life examples coming naturally to any reader's mind.

One only has to read a statement (on p. 346 of the hardcover edition) describing New York as "a foreign city full of a strange race of curiously tiny malformed gray people"* to realize The Right Stuff is not exactly a pinnacle of Objective Journalism (whatever the heck that is). And that's fine - part of the accomplishment of Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, and inheritors like Lester Bangs and Nick Tosches was to give the lie to the notion of journalistic objectivity. Just know that you're looking for a straight-foward presentation of facts, figures, and information about Project Mercury and its astronauts, you're probably gonna want to start somewhere else.
The upside of Wolfe's New Journalistic approach is that book is a tremendous amount of fun, recounting the stories of the Mercury astronauts with a wry, ironic wit that's all his own. There are, however, a few stylistic problems here - Wolfe's tone doesn't always suit the material at hand, particularly in the first chapter, which deals with the tragic deaths of many of the early test pilots of experimental jet planes. Also, he has a fondness for exclamatory interjections (e.g., on the very first page we get , "But the day was young! And what a setting she had for her imminent enlightenment! And what a picture she herself presented!" - all in a row, just like that) that can grow tiresome after a while.
For the most part, though, the writing works - Wolfe pulls off the admirable feat of making fun of pulp writing styles and reveling in them, often simultaneously. Also, there are some long paragraphs in here (particularly the one towards the end of the book where he describes Chuck Yeager's final test flight) that are minor miracles of literary construction.
All in all, definitely worth reading if you're interested in the subject at hand, or in exploring a unique literary voice.
*Not to worry, New Yorkers - Wolfe makes fun of Texans, Russians, and just about everybody else here, too.

The 80's were a time where people thought they were indestructable. Including Sherman McCoy. A hotshot investment banker he has it all. A Beautiful 12 Room Apt in Central Park, An Adorable Six Year Old Daughter who attends an exclusive Private School and a Interior Decorator Wife. He also has a mistress on the other side of town named Maria who's much older husband is the driving force behind a multi-million dollar airplane empire and together they take the wrong exit in the wrong section of town and hit an innocent black man named Henry Lamb and then the chaos ensues. From Reverend Bacon's quest for showing how racist New York is to Peter Fallow's desire use the story to get to the big time, Sherman's world is turned upside down with some pretty frightening yet hilarious consequences. It also teaches us that no matter how good our life is, we can automatically lose it with the snap of the fingers as Sherman found out the hard way. Tom Wolfe is next to Jackie Collins and John Grisham the very few white authors who can do a black character down pat. A must read book for anyone who's enjoyed A Man In Full.

I read another of his books years ago, and I had apparently forgotten what a masterful writer he is-- this is brilliant! Hilarious and detailed in all the right ways. I highly recommend the audio book-- this is one of a few that I've done that seem to really add something special with the audio version.

I don't wish to make a proclamation that this is the "best American book ever written," nor do I want to complain about an "inadequate" ending. All I can say about this book is that, from the first chapter's over-the-top description of the mayor's speech in Harlem, "Bonfire" consistently held my attention. (I'm sorry to say that I can't say the same about the more recent "A man in Full.") The sheer unfortunate reality of Wolfe's writing is, as many will tell you, a precise color photograph taken then and there in 1987, complete with polarizing filter and an all-too-true vibrancy. It's the kind of book that might be depressing to read soon after its publication and yet evokes quite a few biting, almost nostalgic memories of those infamously coarse upwardly-mobile days of yore. And while I was a mere four years old when I myself was caught in the middle of that web of 58th-and-Sutton "would you like to draw pictures in the Met, Samantha?" Upward Mobility, this seems to accurately capture that era that I at the time failed to understand but am now sure existed just as Wolfe has said.
And yet "Bonfire" is by no means historical fiction. Rather, our good friend Tom manages to do what I've always maintained a good satirist should do: Keep a perfect distance. Wolfe manages to edge close enough to his characters to dig into their minds and show us what's inside -- and yet he stays far enough away that he can poke fun and them with his usual slightly-supercilious air.
This perfect distance of his seems to be what ensures a constantly entertaining read. Seldom do the often-lengthy descriptions bore the reader; such minor allusions as that to the "tub and shower stall module -- module! -- a single molded unit that deflected slightly when he stepped into the tub" remain startling real, making the abrupt ending not at all unsatisfying but rather entirely appropriate and understandable; with literature this interesting, why would one ask for a happy ending?

Is Bonfire of the Vanities a period piece? When reading a book from a previous time period, one might begin to ponder that very legitimate concern? It is, but it isn't. Allow me to elucidate. Bonfire garners irrepressible staying power as a scathing, sardonic, and witty treatise exposing the greed, glamour, decadence, and moral decay of the 80's not unlike The Roaring 20's of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. By no means is Bonfire in the same boat as Gatsby, but nonetheless, it's in the same ballpark, if you will.
Having never read Tom Wolfe before, I must say that I came away quite impressed and entertained by his singular ability to instantaneously transfer from one character's perspective to another at the drop of a dime(e.g. going from Reverend Bacon in the decrepit racially-charged milieu of The Bronx to Sherman McCoy in the plush comfortable confines of Park Avenue). Wolfe's merciless satire and scathing cynicism lends itself to all of his eccentrically diverse motley cadre of characters. As a testament to Wolfe's eclectic acumen, the author definitively nails the veritable cornucopia of targets ranging the gamut from the sheltered luxury apartments, entre nous lavish fetes of the social elite X-Rays of Park Avenue, the high-pressure environment of Sherman's Wall Street, the dog eat dog baseness of Vogel & co. at The Bronx PD and jail, the unmitigated political pandering of Weiss and Kramer at the DA's office, the Machiavellian glibness of Peter Fallow of The City Light, and, last but definitely not least, the self-serving specious "racial activism" of Reverend Bacon.
The vastly paradoxical upshot of it all is this my friends: Although this extraordinarily divergent melange of characters exists in strikingly unique socioeconomic environments, they all, however, undoubtedly contribute to the prodigious confluence of flagrant self-absorbtion, blatant egotism, deplorable moral degradation, pernicious greed, and the despicable venality that cryptically ties all of them together into one infinitely vacuous morally depraved vacuum categorically devoid of any semblance of moral absolutes. Ahh...the irony of it all! Wolfe's ingenious penchant for piquant characterization and witty dialogue makes for a smooth and fluid read that entertains as well as educates. Bonfire IS a period piece, but it remains just as provocative today as it was upon its release. Period(pardon the pun).
"A liberal is a conservative who has been arrested."
- Sherman McCoy

I saw the bizarre trainwreck of a movie many moons ago and did not give much thought to reading the book. There are times I wonder at my own stupidity. It was only as the year 2001 dawned that I began smarten up. Why had I never read this book? Got me. Two my favorite books of recent vintage owed a debt to Wolfe (or mentioned him outright): Turn of the Century (Kurt Anderson) and Last Days of Disco (Whit Stillman). I figured maybe it was time to read the Master himself.
I remember when Man in Full came out, it was as if George Washington himself had risen from the dead. Who was this guy? I consider myself quite well-educated, but it was time educate myself about Tom Wolfe. I bought the paperback.
I just finished it. I'm sad because the book ended. I love anything about the '80s, but this book basically defined it. The style is priceless as are the characters. These characters, even the smaller ones, Abe Weiss, Miss Shelly Thomas, Arthur Ruskin among them, are fully formered. The book is a true masterpiece. I knew it was a satire, but came to really care about these characters, winners and losers all of them. When I took a step back I could see the brillance the names in this book, satirically speaking: The author Nunnally Voyd, the law firm Dunning, Sponget, and Leach. And on and on. Peter Fallow. I should stop here. Readers should find out these treasures on their own. The book is so great because it evokes a time not long ago yet now a memory. Wolfe brings it life again. It works at so many levels. Tragedy, farce, brillance... Don't be dumb like I was. Just go read it. You'll thank the true of Master of the Universe later.

Good book. The movie is great, one of those ones I have on DVD and watch a couple of times a year. For some reason I waited this long before reading the book. Very entertaining, they left some of the funniest stories out of the movie. It's basically a story of the early days of test pilots and the start of America's space exploration. Other then the history, it explores why men risk their lives by testing the limits of aircraft design or to thrust their bodies into outer space. If your a history or science geek I recomend it.

Tom Wolfe's kinetic style of writing takes some getting used to. He piles words on top of words, images on top of images, flinging them all at the reader with a fastball pitch. The pitch, though, is well-thrown.
Wolfe's subject is New York City during the 1980s. He touches as many groups as he can -- wealthy Upper East Side socialites, tabloid journalists, criminals and burnt-out agents of justice in the Bronx, cut-throat sleazy lawyers, unscrupulous Wall Street stockbrokers... No class of people escapes having its faults exposed in Wolfe's sharp, accurate prose.
Wolfe is sociologist first, novelist second. He probes the psychology of all these disparate groups and finds a common denominator: selfishness. All people are out for themselves no matter who is destroyed along the way.
At the same time he satirizes the dark side of the human experience, Wolfe makes it impossible to hate any of the characters. There is no true villain in this story. As readers, we are left with just the uncomfortable sensation of recognizing human nature's ugly parts.
"How much differently would you act in this situation?" is Wolfe's implicit question. There are no easy answers.

Tom Wolfe's research for The Right Stuff, is more historically accurate than the movie version. The book was warmly received by the astronaut community, especially among the surviving members of the original Mercury 7 astronauts. The book goes back to the beginning to the test pilots flying from Murac Field, now known as Edwards Air Force Base. The early jet and rocket research conducted at Edwards Air Force Base, led to Project Mercury, Project Gemini, Project Apollo and the Space Shuttle. You can very easily get lost in the pages of this book. Not only did Mr. Wolfe do his research on the historic aspect of the book, he also researched the personal lives of the pilots, including Chuck Yeager and Scott Crossfield. As the book comes forward in time, Mr. Wolfe researched the personal lives of the Mercury 7 astronauts. The competition for astronaut selection, was intense and in competition with the Soviet Union. After the selection of the Mercury 7, the astronauts did have an agreement with Life Magazine to do their life stories. This is one aspect of the movie that agrees with the book. The Media's aggressive way in pursuing their stories, was not too well received by the astronauts. The issue regarding "extra-ciricular" was mentioned in the book and the movie. The way the issue was presented in the movie, was completely different than the book version. In the book, Gus Grissom was accurately presented, a pilot and an engineer. After the explosive bolts on the access hatch of Liberty Bell 7 were activated, Grissom was concerned. He also wanted to find the answers on why they activated. It was later theorized, static electricity from the rotor wash of the recovery helicopter, led to the accidential activation of the explosive bolts and the loss of the Liberty Bell 7 spacecraft. The way Gus Grissom was portrayed in the movie, was not to well received by the astronaut community, especially among the surviving members of the Mercury 7 astronauts. In an interview of Wally Schirra that I seen years later on NASA Television, Captain Schirra talked about this very issue. Captain Schirra stated the book was more historically accurate. He didn't agree with the way the story was presented and did not agree with the way Gus Grissom was portrayed in the movie. Captain Schirra stated, the movie should have been titled "Animal House in Space!" One of the other astronauts who was mentioned in the book, was Deke Slayton. When Captain Slayton was selected for astronaut training, he had an irregular heartbeat. NASA's medical staff were hoping the condition would clear itself, before Slayton made his first spaceflight. Deke Slayton would have made his first mission, after John Glenn. A few months before his mission, the irregular heartbeat did not clear itself. Medical stardards at that time, forced the NASA flight surgeon to remove Deke Slayton from his flight and was replaced by Scott Carpenter. Deke Slayton became the Director of Flight Crew Operations and was a very effective and respected leader of the astronaut community.
For anyone who is interested in the beginning of the jet age and the early years of the space program, The Right Stuff is recommended reading. The book presents a excellent overview of that time in history and it explores the personal lives of the test pilots and the astronauts. After reading the book, the Internet will allow you to do any follow-up or detailed research on the subject if you so choose.

The frank story delivered by Wolfe has a powerful message that rings true in today's society, it was just a little long - 700 pages (I often found my self sifting through meaningless paragraphs). Sherman McCoy, who is a rich Wallstreet aristocrat, runs over a Bronx city hoodlum after being threatened. It is a commentary of 1980s society, and can be extended into the present time. Materialism, egotism, hypocrisy...even the middle-class assistant D.A., Kramer, is subject to these human flaws as he uses the case for personal gain and glory, as does the DA in his re-election. McCoy sums up a major point in the book in saying to his lawyer, "Your self -- I don't know how to explain it, but if, God forbid, anything like this ever happens to you, you'll know what I mean. Your self...is other people, all the people you're tied to, and it's only a thread." Of course, if this thread is cut, like it is for McCoy, what becomes of that "self?" Wolfe's story becomes a Greek tragedy on the major flaw of humans -- finding their identity in people, possessions, and power.

What do you get when you mix an historian and a world-class writer? The Right Stuff. Tom Wolfe takes us back to a black and white time when America was apple pie and comic book heroes--at least in nostalgic hindsight. Amidst these glory years of the '50s and '60s there was trouble brewing, however. The Russians were winning the Space Race. Up to the plate step a group of true blue American heroes, men like John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Alan Shepard, and Chuck Yeager, men with the Right Stuff. Together they overcame technical barriers, tragedy, and the limits of human endurance to prevent the Soviets from controlling Space, the high ground from which they could drop nukes on us at will.
This superbly told story brings history alive. We are brought into the lives and heads of these complex real-life characters, family men who risked 25% mortality rates to "press the envelope" first as test pilots and then as astronauts. We cheer as the records fall and mourn the loss of those who "crash and burn."
Full research, high use of language, insightful character analysis, and exciting drama. You can't go wrong with the Right Stuff. --Christopher Bonn Jonnes, author of Wake Up Dead.

This book is one of the best accounts of, indeed any scene, I have ever read. Wolfe, with his half academic half layman writing style, explores the men and indeed the whole phenomenon, that was the American space program in the 50ies and 60ies. In a delightful manner he gets to the heart of what makes the people involved "tick", and does a great job in bringing their feelings and through to the reader. The reader can truly emerge him/herself in this exciting world of fast planes, fast cars, hope, fear and glory.

The only thing "wrong" with this book is that it is too short. I would've loved to see 50-75 more pages telling more about the "aftermath", as it were, but that is merely because the book was such a jolly good read to begin with. And, I must add, I'm not even interested in planes, speed or space programs or indeed American history.

Highest possible recommendation.

If F. Scott Fitzgerald's Jay Gatsby was the Modern-Man of his generation, Tom Wolf's everyman hero in "Bonfire of the Vanities is our Boomer man," the guy who can't quite make ends meet on 998,000 bucks a year. Although Wolfe is best known for his "new journalism" stethopscopic view of America in works like "Electric Acid Cool Aid Test" and "The Pump House Gang," his first foray into the land of the novel is novel indeed.

Bonfire is a hybrid of novel and journalism with a pinch of Woody Allen. Wolfe's "social X-rays" scavenge cosmopolitan Manhattan cocktail parties as the vultures of the downtown poverty industry exploit a yuppie faux pas that sends his Boomer hero into a crashing Sartrean abyss.

Angular as a spaghetti Western, zanier than Monty Python, and truer than Sinclair Lewis, Mr. Wolf's excursion as a novelist leaves us wondering why he doesn't do more.

For a very long time "The Right Stuff" was my favorite book (excluding the Bible, which is unique). Even after reading Dante's "Divine Comedy," I'm not sure Wolfe's book has been dislodged from its position.
Wolfe begins to work his literary magic on the first page. A young, beautiful woman is worried about her husband, a Navy test pilot, having heard that there has been a plane crash. Space buffs like me reading the book are fascinated to realize that the woman is Jane Conrad, wife of Pete Conrad (which, incidentally, tells us that the bad news that day won't be about her husband). If this scene appeared in a different book about the space program, even one as superb as Andrew Chaikin's "A Man on the Moon" or Jim Lovell and Jeffrey Kluger's "Apollo 13," the account of events, while exciting and suspenseful, would remain on a somewhat mundane plane of everyday reality. Wolfe's glittering, idiosyncratic literary style lifts events into a world of super-reality. We experience Jane Conrad's concern and dread as if we were Jane Conrad. Perhaps more than any other book I have read, "The Right Stuff" has caused me to remember the events it relates as if I lived through them rather than reading about them.
One noteworthy feature of Wolfe's style in this book is his nearly Wagnerian use of verbal "leitmotiven," key phrases which pop up over and over in the book and come to convey far more than the simple content of the words. Anyone who has read the book will remember for a long time Wolfe's use of such phrases as "bad streak," "Flying and Drinking and Drinking and Driving," "the Integral," "our rockets always blow up," "the Presbyterian Pilot," "single combat warrior," "ziggurat," and, of course, "the right stuff."
The book also contains the funniest set-piece in any book I have ever read, the description of the celebration when the astronauts and their families first visit Houston, including the fan dance by the ancient Sally Rand. Interestingly, in the excellent film version of the book this scene was transformed from a hilarious comedy sequence into something elegiac, intercut with the sequence of Chuck Yeager bailing out of a plane (which happened on a different day in reality and in the book) to create drama and suspense. In this radically different form the two sequences are just as effective in the movie as they are in the book.
"The Right Stuff" has sometimes been criticized for being overly fictionalized, or at least speculative. These criticisms probably have a great deal of validity, but they do not alter the fact that "The Right Stuff" is the definitive evocation of that brief era around 1960 when almost anything, good or bad, seemed possible. It is an unforgettable literary achievement.

On the surface, the book is a satire of the puffed up 80s. The "Vanities" that are being blown up are all the pretensions that people put around themselves. Sherman McCoy is a man who would've exuded strength and power in a prior age. But is he a "Master of the Universe" bond trader (a term coined by Tom Wolfe, later to make it into the popular lexicon) or just another fluffed up product of society? Indeed, the book explores this question. You'll be surprised by the answer!
Is it just a novel of the 80s? I disagree, for several reasons...
- The greed of the 80s reappeared in the past 5 years.
- If you look hard enough, one of the characters in the book is running for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004.
- The deep characters Wolfe creates ring true today.
- New York again sees itself in a time of great change. Maybe there are lessons in this literature?
Is it the Great American Novel? Who knows... But it can be read with "A Man in Full" to understand grit, determination and what does make America different.

Tom Wolfe is a great writer. He uses language beautifully, develops characters extremely well, and creates good drama. I would, however, say that he is a better essayist than novelist and I would recommend The Right Stuff or The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test over this book because they are more focussed and he keeps his story together better in them. With that said though, I would highly recommend Bonfire of the Vanities. Wolfe describes the socialites, lowlifes, politicians, reporters, and other various characters who populate the New York scene and all of their particular vanities in great detail. They are believable, whether they are likable or not is really besides the point, and they come to life with their authentic dialogue and charater flaws. It is a satirical book written by a very observant author, so even those who have not been exposed to this culture is able to become caught up in it and find themselves fascinated by the whole scene. I would recommend this book to anyone who like social critiques, interesting characters, good writing, and a fast paced story.

In *Bonfire of the Vanities*, pop journalist Wolfe takes a sneering satirical look (from a surprisingly European point of view) at American culture and all of its absurdities and obsessions. New York is treated as the microcosm of 80s America with all of its fads, rivalries, economic woes and class inequality mixing together uneasily and then exploding. Sherman McCoy, the supremely irritating central charater, is a fresh-faced adolescent of 38 years who just doesn't get the fact that the world is a harsh, dangerous place--that is until he becomes the fall guy in a politically and racially charged scandal. Peter Fallow (by far the best character in the book)is a delightfully cynical and misanthropic British journalist who observes the parade the do-gooder activists, slick political manipulators, confused cops, thuggish cops, skeletal society ladies, urban punks, garish architecture, trash culture and trendy clubs with an acid wit and always a few stiff drinks under his belt. If they ever make a real movie out of this book (the existing one doesn't count) PLEASE get Jeremy Irons to play Fallow. Some people see this book as some kind of right-wing propaganda. It isn't. Wolfe, despite his own more or less conservative views, allows the story to tell itself without a lot of interpretation from above. Each character is a complex individual with his or her own unique motivations and mixture of vice and virtue. We spend time inside the minds and private lives of a wide variety of people and are allowed to make our own judgements about who deserves what measure of praise or blame. If there is any prejudice in the book it is against people who simplify complex issues. Wolfe's world, like the real thing, is brimming with paradox.

I chose to read this book for my history class, and I was not disappointed in the slightest. This book has it all: adventure, courage, and satire. It is the story of America's first astronauts, some of the bravest men and most skilled flyers in history.
The Right Stuff was also made into a movie, and although the movie was great, people who have seen it haven't gotten the full story of the early space program unless they read the book. Wolfe creates several conflicts that don't show up in the film, such as the ambition of the X-15 astronauts to beat the Mercury Seven into space, as well as the conflict between man and machine. The film ends when Cooper's Mercury 9 lifts off, and that is disappointing. Wolfe's book describes how Cooper performed a manual re-entry and proved that the astronaut was truly a pilot and not an observer. Wolfe also argues that Project Mercury, as well as the Soviet Vostok program, built mutual respect between the two nations and effectively ended the Cold War.
The book is quite accurate, as most of the events are corroborated by Gordon Cooper in his autobiography (which I also recommend.) This novel will go down as a classic, and it will be read by generations to come.

Although I have enjoyed some of Tom Wolfe's early nonfiction work, Bonfire languished on my shelf, unread, for several years. For some reason, I had dry and boring in mind for this book, which turn out patently untrue.

To the reader who expects a true picture of gritty life in a big city, or a real picture of relations between groups of people, as other reviewers have called this, look elsewhere! Bonfire is satire...it is exaggeration...it is a farce.

Great truths, however, often lie in humor. Wolfe has created a world where the reader manages to despise just about every character. You may be at least indifferent to the cops, or Fitzgibbon, the assistant DA who still seems to have his head on straight, but these characters just provide enough temperance to remind you how you hate everyone else.

Wolfe's use of the English language is something like Shakespeare meets tabloid journalist, and his verbiage never fails to trigger an emotion, or two, often laughter and anger or despair at the same time.

I often found I could not put the book down, but unfortunately,it seemed at the moments of highest suspense, the wordiness begins to drag, slowing the pace to a crawl, when you'd most like to fly.

Wolfe is (arguably, of course) one of the greatest writers and commentators on popular culture than this country has ever read. And nowhere is this claim better embodied than in the masterful The Right Stuff. Most people remember the movie, which did an able enough job of capturing the most obvious of Wolfe's subtle criticism of the first American astronauts. But it is only through his text that we realize the completeness of his extended comparison of men like John Glenn ("a balding and slightly tougher looking version of the cutest-looking freckle-faced boy you ever saw") to men like Chuck Yeager ("the boondocker, the boy from the back country, with only a high-school education, no credentials, no cachet or polish of any sort, who took off the feed-store overalls and put on a uniform and climbed into an airplane and lit up the skies over Europe"). Whatever your feelings about the space program, this book is a compelling and informative read by a living legend.

Some pee in their space suits, others catch some zee's, a few might think about home and family. Such is the earthy fare of space heroes, suited up, strapped down, ready to be zootered into orbit. Such are the revelations in Tom Wolfe's classic best seller on the early years of the U.S. space program.
We love the stories of Wolfe's titillating disrobing of Astronaut's egos, enemas, and Konakai cookies. There's also the mocking irreverence as technology goes bust. Remember the unmanned Redstone rocket fiasco at Cape Carnaveral in 1960. The great beast on the launch pad, embers stirring ..5..4..3..2..then..pop. In a little fizzle the escape tower launches leaving behind a rocket, the assembled dignitaries and other stunned guests. Most of whom look on bemused, confused, and silent as the one act play takes its course. Oh yes, and then there is all that fun with the "no see 'im bugs", Pete Conrad's jalapeno "gift", Chuck Yeager's drawl, Edwards, Panchos, and the Chief Designer, Builder of the Integral!
Let's stay with the Builder of the Integral for a moment. Mr Wolfe writes that just as the Americans were about to seek some space triumph the Russian Chief Designer would spoil the show, putting satellites, dogs and men of the Red Sickle in space before the U.S. Does the Chief Designer's spirit live on? Can we question Mr Wolfe's treatment of his subject, spoiling the the "electrifying best seller"? Is Tom guilty of a few porkies here and there, a touch too much creativity...hmm? More informed readers are perhaps best placed to judge, but an example throws a questioning shadow.
Tom makes much of the competitive instincts of the original seven Mercury astronauts with John Glenn, "the Deacon", the "apple-pie" hero, coming in for extra special treatment. Tom writes of Glenn's over-the-top performance at the 1959 Dolly Madison press conference that announced the Original Seven to the world. When they were asked how many of them expected to return safely to earth, Wolfe records that Glenn, "one couldn't help noticing", had both hands up in the air. The others, he suggested, could barely raise one. What perhaps has gone unnoticed is a photograph of the event (one appears in Time-Life's "Life in Space" book) that shows Wally Schirra, too, had both hands up! This is hardly an earth shattering revelation but suggests Mr Wolfe has a case to answer for over-exuberance. How many of Tom's other tales suffer the same fate?
The book, we should not forget, is a great read. Just how many wrong stunts go into the "The Right Stuff" is something we should ponder.

I was put off this book for quite some time because of having seen the film, but, finally decided to give it a go (despite having a paperbackl edition with the film characters on the cover...) This book is an example of what a meticulous, fearless and talented writer of prose can come up with in response to the world around him. While being a great 'page-turner' as far as plot goes, Wolfe manages, through a complex web of ironies and double ironies, to examine humanity as a social creature in a certain time and place. He deals so breath-takingly honestly with his characters that many readers might blanche, and want to point fingers at the author, something Wolfe is couragous enough to bear, obviously. He does not set himself up as a prophet - like many modern 'social-awareness' authors - and I am sure does not absolve himself from many of the 'vanities' that are examined in this book. He tries to be honest, deal honestly with his characters and, thus, his readers, which is perhaps so strange in this literary day and age that it is considered reactionary. It is not. It is a novelist. I will certainly be reading more Wolfe, who has now become my favourite living American author.

Tom Wolfe, an eloquent, if sometimes pessimistic, writer who deeply understands modern culture, wrote this massive, classic tale of greed, ambition and power. He casts the story of financier Sherman McCoy in the financial world of Wall Street, but includes the racial, political and economic issues of New York City in the early 1980s. Even 13 years after its publication date, this is still a gripping read. You can use this book as the starting point for reading about business culture from a fictionalized perspective. Or, you can combine it with Michael Lewis' Liar's Poker and The New New Thing, for insight from fact and fiction into the major episodes of greed and economic boom in the past 20 years. This undeclared trilogy examines the desire - not confined to Americans, though the books are U.S.-based - to achieve wealth at any cost. We at getAbstract.com recommend this book, all by itself, as a seminal volume in business fiction.

Bonfire of the Vanities is one of the great page turners of the last half of the 20th century. Wolfe combines comedy with scathing social commentary, as a blue blooded Wall Streeter takes the wrong exit off the highway and two cultures collide with tragi-comic results. It was impossible to put this book down, even though it is quite lengthy. The beleaguered Bronx judge, the girlfriend, the Harlem reverend who thrives on playing the race card for his own greater glory and the slimy reporter are just some of the characters who ring true.
For those who saw the movie, don't let that turn you off. The whole premise was changed and it was a typical Hollywood bastardization. Wolfe tried a similar sweep of the cultural landscape in "A Man In Full" but lost his way halfway through that book. There are no wrong notes in Bonfire; it's a snapshot of New York politcally and culturally in the late 80's, and it's amazing how little has changed in today's world.

Tantalizingly fascinating, The Bonfire of the Vanities is a deeply detailed and yet enthralling account of the entwining ways in which the forces of opportunistic politics, ugly racism, greedy Wall Street, gullible public sentiments, sinister profit motive and compelling lust interacted in New York City of 1980's. It is an outstanding work of fiction so vividly depicted and so richly crafted that you might feel yourself in the middle of action. The author's creativity with words and ideas while narrating very plausible events and developments adds remarkable color and candor to the plot. Phrases such as `laboratory of human relations', `big breasted eyes', and "master of universe', are so apt in their effect that you find yourself longing for more.

At the script level, The Bonfire of the Vanities is a tragedy of a Wall Street bonds trader whose sheer misfortune causes his downfall though he does not endear himself to the readers by his philandering and vain ways that he feels he is entitled too. It also is the tragedy of an unfortunate black boy who gets killed for no fault of his, of a spouse whose only fault is that she has aged the best way she could and a 6 year old girls who `loses' her father to bizarre sequences of New York life. At a broader plane though, The Bonfire of the Vanities is the tragedy of the `Greatest City on the Planet', a city that has scaled every possible height and yet whose inhabitants have not overcome even the very basic vices that plague the human race. Powered by the avarice for lust, weaved around the gluttony for pride, fired by the envy of the have not's and the wrath of the racially deprived, New York is tortured by the sloth of conscience. Rarely has this tragedy been better depicted than in this landmark novel.

Maybe you've seen the Academy Award winning movie. You might have been elevated by listening to the soaring soundtrack by Bill Conte (of Rocky fame). Now, delve into the details by reading the full account, the revealing back story that precedes the well-known film scenes.

A daughter of a World War II aviator, there was no question I wouldn't enjoy this highly applauded 1983 movie with my father. I was a young girl when the space race launched in the early 1960s- but I enjoyed watching a more filled out version of the process that produced our very first astronauts.

So much so that I picked up the book that had inspired this true life tale. I'm so glad I did. Much of what Wolfe wrote did not, could not make it into the final film. As it was, it was three-hours, too long to be commercially profitable. It is a shame. But fans have other alternatives! As good as the film is, the book is astronomically better. (Sorry for the pun, devil made me do it!)

Wolfe entertains us with history and America's fixation with heroes. I was most surprised by John Glenn. I had read that the film, released at the same time Glenn was posturing to run for president, somehow hindered his run. In the film, he came off a bit " goody two shoes." He was a good guy, yes. But incredibly brave. Many people do not know he was known as "Magnet Ass" a moniker he earned and reasons I will leave you to discover on your own.. His story, his pre-astronaut, pre-fame life alone is worth the price of the paperback.

Treat yourself to an incredible chapter of our history, and why Tom Wolfe is one of America's finest contemporary writers. The Right Stuff is A Okay...and should be listened to, viewed, and most importantly, read.

I cannot believe that it has actually been over a decade since I read Tom Wolfe's THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES; it is a brilliant and hilarious entertaining work of satirical fiction, and a dead-on accurate social commentary of everything that made up the 1980's, commonly (and accurately) known as The Greed Decade. This includes the incendiary racial conflagrations that had been simmering throughout the 1970's that finally began to unravel during the 80's, aided and abetted by an increasingly sensationalist media that practiced underhanded "divide and conquer" tactics in order to keep the middle and working classes down by improperly (and sneakily) shifting the discussion from class to race.
Wolfe captures all that here, albeit in a lighter tone, by following four separate tracks concurrently, and how they all come together: Financially successful but amoral and philandering nouveau-riche bond trader Sherman McCoy, professional successful but financially wanting assistant prosecutor Lawrence Kramer, professionally unsuccessful and perpetually inebriated British-born tabloid 'journalist' Peter Fallow, and socially powerful (but under-respected) self-proclaimed African-American leader Reverend Reginald Bacon. The bonfire that their vanities create is fascinating; but what is best about this book is the insightful and real-to-life humor/social commentary that Wolfe weaves into the story throughout. If you're a relatively young reader who was born in the 80's and thusly do not remember it the way that, let's say, those of us born in 1967 do, then the reading of this book is absolutely essential to understanding all the different dysfunctional facets that made the 1980's the way it was.
Do not be put off by the story's length (705 pages); it is so enjoyable and is such a compulsive page-turner that it is likely that it will only take you a week or less to get through it all. Pick this one up and treat yourself to the hilarious world of THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES---and if you must, rent the 1990 Brian De Palma-directed misfire and see just how totally inept Hollywood was in capturing this world. THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES has earned its proper place one of the greatest---and most important---works of fiction in the 20th Century.
MOST RECOMMENDED; AGES 17 & UP

Those who are familiar with the theatrical version of The Right Stuff will likely question whether actually reading the underlying book should bother. I know I sure felt that way, even after acknowledging that the book was likely better. But some compelling aspects of the novel are worth exploring on one's own.

Wolfe's fascinating imagery, for example, showing how John Glenn, Alan Shepard, and the remaining astronaut lot dethroned the old guard is one aspect worth experiencing. Another is the retelling of each astronaut's marvelous flight. The depth, detail, and imagination radiating from the page perfectly captures the novelty of the time, exciting even for those who can only know a world where space flight is somewhat commonplace. Chuck Yeager's final flight in the experimental NF-104A, his last record breaking attempt, is equally eye opening. The political wrangling between NASA, the Air Force, and others that was critical to the Apollo program's success, while much less exciting, is no less essential to understanding the anxiousness of a country living in the shadow of the apparently unstoppable Red Menace.

For all these reasons, Wolfe's nonfiction novel is truly a testament to the bravery, ambition, and determination of all of these men and to the country who was determined to cast their silhouettes among the stars. All who are interested in the rise of the world's premier space program should take the extra time to experience it.

In a life of great writing, for me this is Tom Wolfe's greatest work. Its success was cataclysmic and was due in part to its perfection in timing. It hit at the very moment when the self anointed "Masters of the Universe" were becoming exposed to the general public and the materialistic and hedonistic culture of the eighties was becoming transformed. (At the time we didn't realize it would be a trade of the Culture of Greed for the Ravenous Orgy of Greed in the nineties.)

This book offered wonderful phrases such as Social X-Rays, Lemon Tart, and so many more that you will be amazed when you re-read it or read the book for the first time. It has a fascinating story that weaves together the cultures of privilege (for there are many) and the dregs of misery. Each and every character is presented as someone with his or her own delusions of self, hypocrisies, and contradictory motivations.

Now, this is not a novel in the sense of Thomas Mann or any other psychological writer. This is a novel of social reporting that continues to stand the test of time and you will gain from reading it several times. However, do NOT under any circumstances think that the movie made with the same title as this book in any way represents the wonderful things these pages contain. The movie is a complete botch while the book remains a treasure.

Entertaining comedy/drama/satire, worth reading . Beautifully written, with 3 finely developed main "protagonists" charging through a complex web of a plot. Wolfe paints wonderful scenes, capturing the sounds, movements, and expressions in a courtroom or dinner party, making you feel like you're there. Although in some ways the book could be considered a period piece, set in the bond-trader boom in the 80's, this doesn't really detract because the story is really about human nature. If you want to be uplifted, this is not your novel--it's portrays a deeply cynical view of humanity (at least the part in New York!) and there are hardly any inspirational characters.

Flaws:
Even though a recurring theme of the book is racial divides (although I'm not convinced that's what it's really about), Wolfe's extensive use of racial stereotypes is a bit offensive and occasionally confusing. Although I suspect (or hope?) the stereotyping was supposed to be part of the satire, it seemed like it served as a shortcut to character development, for example, an Irish policeman is stubborn and loyal. It may have been hard to fully develop all the characters in the complex plot, but there must be a better form of shorthand. It also runs a risk of misinterpretation...not every person in America understands that Irishmen are stubborn and loyal (or whatever was intended).

I also felt that Wolfe was assuming some baseline knowledge about New York City and its neighborhoods, racial stereotypes, etc, that not every reader (including me) necessarily has.

Neither of these flaws ruined the book for me. The superb writing, intricate plot, and fascinating characters made it worth my time.

The book is a wonderful example of the need for the passage of time before a realistic assessment can be made of an event. Mr. Wolfe gives a very accurate portrayal of the 1950s and early 60s and how logic was thrown out the window in the pursuit of perceived Russian space dominance. Henry Luce, one of the founders of TIME, set LIFE magazine as the public relations arm of NASA and fabricated much of the astronauts lives for the sake of American boosterism. This does not take away from the fact that these gung-ho pioneers with very out-sized egos helped launch space exploration. Yet, it wasn't only the Original Seven who had swelled heads. Their wives, the engineers, the politicians, the scientists, the military test pilots and administrators are all caught up in heightening their stature. Mr. Wolfe does seem to enjoy ridiculing the dimwitted television press and posturing politicians (especially VP Lyndon Johnson.) Mr. Wolfe's work has a tendency to be overly dramatic (the guy's is waaaaaay too exclamation-point happy!!!!!!!!!!) with a sarcastic undertone. The author does an especially great job in describing the first three launches as well as Chuck Yeager's test flights with jets. The book grabbed me by the lapels and didn't let go until the very last page. A truly informative, entertaining story.

From the sound of it, a book about astronauts sounds like it would be interesting. But if you really think about it, do you really care to know every detail of the story of astronauts? I wouldn't care. Of course maybe someone older who lived through the hype back then would really enjoy reading the ins and outs of the program. But to a young buck, astronauts are cool and all but give me the facts, give me the meat; I don't care for the jargon, the details of each flight etc. Better yet, give me the juice on the tragic accidents that occurred in the space program - like Apollo 13.

Well, Wolfe does not indulge us. He gives the long and short of the Mercury program which was the first to put a man into Earth's orbit. However he writes in a way that the story is not dry or dull at all. It's fascinating and spellbinding. It's history but it does not read like history. It reads like a novel. And of course that is the genius of the author. By the end of the book you are left hoping for Wolfe to continue his narrative of the space program but alas it must end somewhere.

Tom Wolfe's books always impress me, and The Bonfire of the Vanities is definitely one of his best works, studying American culture and human behavior through the lens of a criminal trial in New York City.

Sherman McCoy is the main character of the book, but the book also follows the Bronx assistant District Attorney and a newspaper reporter, whose fates intertwine with Sherman's after he is entrenched in the court case. Interestingly, the only true protagonists in the book, the Lamb family, are the only ones who do not get much time on the page beyond the initial accident. They become mere pawns in a much bigger game of egos, where justice is served (or not served) only based on personal gain or loss. The true fate of the Lamb family is hardly relevant to anyone.

Wolfe brilliantly weaves an engaging story, and his prose are crystal clear and entertaining. The plot is enjoyable on the surface level, but the ramifications of everyone's actions will leave a reader thinking for days following the conclusion of this book. I definitely recommend this to anyone.

It's hard to believe that 20 years have passed since this book was first published. I had a chance to read it during the recent blizzard(s) and was pleased to laugh out loud only to realize that we have sunk further into narcissism than this book so scathingly depicted, to no good end. I actually wonder whether this book would be printed today. Heaven knows, it isn't politically correct. Except for the hating white men, particularly wealthy white men, part. All others portrayed as flawed might not be deemed acceptable for print. The truth is like kryptonite to narcissists. They lose all their power....alas! A great read and a trenchant wit!

"The Bonfire of the Vanities" will be on any self-respecting literature professor's syllabus in the year 2050.

"Students," he or she will thunder, "this book is an incredible example of flawlessly crafted writing by one of the 20th century's greatest authors. Wolfe's keen social observations of life in the 1980s will prove instructive - yet emminently enjoyable - as you are treated to one of the most perceptive, scathing summations of American society that has been written since the days of Mark Twain."

"Thankfully," we can hope the professor will conclude, "we have long since risen above the era of greed, shallowness and opportunism that is portrayed so aptly in this novel."

The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe is an entertaining book that earns the label of a "page-turner" through Wolfe's quality prose and ability to showcase the quirky parts of his characters. It's a good story with big implications, seen from the eyes of a handful of different New Yorkers. The best I can give this novel is good, but not great. It has good scenes and good subject matter, but never quite hits what it set out to.

Wolfe gives you a taste of a lot of interesting things and characters that never get expanded on. When you read the two scenes with Bacon (Al Sharpton-lite) you're captivated by him, but he hardly appears otherwise except for somebody mentioning how terrible he is. We meet the judge Kovitsky early on and he's equally interesting, and he goes unheard of until the climax in which he's supposed to be the crux of the finale. We don't find out that Sherman was once an idealist who wasn't consumed by money and social status until it's way too late to care. Sherman's turn from a wimpy yuppie into an "animal" at the end came off really lame. So now he isn't afraid to lie...wait, hasn't he already lied to everybody he's encountered up to this point?

Wolfe can craft a line with the best of them though, and his humor and descriptive ability usually keeps his stuff afloat when he lacks in other departments. One of the best parts of the book was the dichotomy between Kramer and the women he lusted after. When he was staring down Maria as they interviewed her and his inner dialogue hinted that she might want him, and then we find out that she thought he was a creep was a beautiful notion about how a lot of men think and women's reaction to that. Also when he's rambling to The Girl With the Brown Lipstick about the trial and he thinks she's enthralled with every aspect of it, come to find out at the end of the scene she thinks he's a typical New York male that only talks about themselves. Subtle nuances like this made the book worthwhile despite being bashed over the head with the fact that Jews, Italians, Blacks, Irish, rich people and poor people are different. Wolfe also made it a point to note that everybody who worked for the justice system was bald or balding.

I would have liked to have seen the story go to trial and seen Killian and Kramer going at it with Kovitsky playing mediator. I wanted to see Sherman watch Maria testify under oath and I wanted resolution. I guess I can't fault Wolfe for his ending though, because it's his story and that's how he chose to write it. I can say though that the ending felt like a cop-out and a let down. The book was worth reading and a good addition to the Tom Wolfe canon, but not his best work.

Hands down one of the most enteratining novels that I have ever read, and definitely the best rendering of modern New York City in fiction! This paperback was so ubiquitous I waited 10 years to reluctantly read it, and only because it was one of the only books on the shelf where I was staying. Boy, was I rewarded with this compulsively readable, suspenseful, razor-sharp story. For social satire to be so fiendishly plotted is a real treat and this story will have you racing to its inexorable conclusion. Along the way Wolfe manages to poke his pen into virtually every corner of the city, nailing every character-type in this rollicking comedy. WARNING--Never watch the insulting Brian DePalma movie, surely the worst transfer of a novel to film EVER. Read this peerless novel instead.

Bonfire of the Vanities was the first Tom Wolfe novel I read, not knowing anything about the author, and I was not disappointed! Had I known the book was about an upper class investment banker in the eighties who runs down some black kid in the Bronx I would have never picked it up but once I started reading it the little plotline blurb seemed so insufficient to describe it.

This book seems to have a real talent for spelunking into the darker unseemly depths of human society but at the same time you're staring at the pages half horrified you're also sucked further into the story trying to figure out the whys. I don't think I've ever read a book with a main character as unlikable as this one but at the same time there are moments when you're sitting back thinking how sad it all is, or smiling at some little trifling piece of humanity that shows through. All the characters are keenly humanized. Nothing is held back, and I believe that's the key to this book's success. It catches not only the great human struggle but also the great societal struggle as well with wondrous complexity.

I'm in the process of reading this book the second time and I must say you do get something new out of each little scene the second time around. I really enjoyed this book for not only showing the negatives of the human experience but also little tinges of the positives in various poignant scenes.

I admired Bonfire more for the innovative uses of language than for his social incisiveness. I despise the knee-jerkers who deplore the 80's as a "decade of greed" and point to Wolfe's book as a banner example of that sentiment. Surely, any reader out there would jump at the chace to have the wealth, connections and opportunities that the main character, Sherman McCoy had? Wolfe neatly lays bare the foibles of members from all levels of society. No one is spared, but most people seemed to really enjoy the downfall of Sherman McCoy. I felt nothing but sympathy for the man, but then again I'm always a few steps short of being a pariah. I had an intriguing assignment in a college English class: a favorite book of yours has been banned in your community. Write a spirited defense of the book. The novel I chose: Bonfire of the Vanities...

Tom Wolfe's "The Right Stuff" is a fascinating, in-depth and personal account of the test pilots who pushed the envelope between 1947 and 1963. From Chuck Yeager's historic flight in the Bell X-1, through the seven missions of Project Mercury, and concluding with Yeager's near-catastrophic flight in the NF-104, the book is an enthralling look at the early days of NASA, and of the men and women who made it happen! Of particular interest are passages that didn't make it into the terrific film adaptation, including the failed attempt of astronauts such as Jim Lovell and Pete Conrad to be among the seven; NASA's "shunning" of Scott Carpenter after what they viewed as a near-disastrous flight of Aurora 7, and how Wally Schirra's flight of Sigma 7 was seen as proof of Carpenter's messy handling of the fuel, and; the near-success of test pilots outside of NASA to successfully put a man in space before the first Mercury flights. A thrilling book for readers of history and of good storytelling, I highly recommend it!
Grade: A-

On the plus side, The Bonfire of the Vanities compares well with Balzac's stuff. I mean, the methods are similar. The story follows several very different characters living in New York, and each scene is detailed, particularized, analyzed, painted with a very fine brush. Many layers of New York's society are represented. There are no moral messages, no lessons to be learned, just life in New York in the late 'Eighties or early 'Nineties at its most intense, presented as "business as usual," with corrupt politicians, lascivious prosecutors, moronic members of the jury, conceited stock market honchos, cynical lawyers, less-than-bright policemen, political opportunists, socialites, priests, opera singers, real estate agents with five thousand dollar manicures, rich faithful wives who deserve to be strangled, only it never occurs to anyone to strangle them, mistresses on the make, petty criminals, silly immigrants, bone-headed journalists, feminists of both genders, racial and ethnic tension - and on and on. The book is really a lot of fun.

On the other hand, the opus falls just short of making its author, well, "the Balzac of our time." No scene is picturesque enough to be called cinematographic, and for a novel 800 pages long that's a bit, well, loquacious (on the author's part). The author tends to explain too much, and fits people and scenes together in such a way as to promote his own outlook, leaving the attentive reader no choice but to examine it. Upon closer examination, one realizes that Mr. Wolfe's main purpose is to show that people in general are vile, selfish, obtuse creatures (without exception); that life is a pretty ridiculous affair; and that any joy a person ever derives from living is brief, accidental, and usually comes at the expense of others. To put it plainly, THERE IS NO GOD in this novel. It was written by a fierce atheist. There is neither faith, hope, nor love in it. None. Life is algebraically plain and tedious.

(I realize I said earlier there were no moral messages in the book. There aren't any. The above is an OUTLOOK, not a message).

Literature thrives on extraordinary situations in which characters are inspired to perform extraordinary acts. The element of surprise in Wolfe's novel is purely circumstantial. Folks have no fre will in this story. (All atheists are determinists more or less by definition, I suppose).

In the past, I've had some interesting experiences related to the publication of this novel. Two years after it came out (in the early 'Nineties, I believe), the news finally reached the Philistines, and by Philistines I mean those representatives of the middle class (and, sometimes, the upper middle class; I have nothing to say about the actual upper class since no one, not even the representatives of the said class themselves, can figure out what the hell they're up to, what it is they do all day, and what their problem is) ... uh ... where was I? ... Philistines ... those representatives of the middle class that once in a while make a half-hearted effort to appear CULTURED, which, in their view, means catching a program on the History Channel once in a while and telling others that they're reading "this book, it's actually pretty good." They never seem to finish this book. I mean, they sort of struggle through the first twenty pages, and then skim through the rest, and make plans to read it properly when they visit Aruba next year, or some such. They're always too busy, they never have any "free time." One gets the impression that if they stopped being busy for a moment, civilization would just collapse and never recover. Anyway, this dude had a copy of "Bonfire" in his briefcase and was telling me (his colleague) how everybody had recommended this book to him. He was going to read it when he had some free time. He actually DID take it to Aruba (there was also a wife involved, I believe). He came back, I believe, without having finished it. A year later he died. He was a good guy, too. Reading just wasn't "his thing," as Philistines like to say.

Anyway, when "Bonfire" came out, the hype was considerable, which for me is nearly always a turn-off. And then the movie came out (which, incidentally, was far more politically incorrect than the book, and the choice of actors and actresses was just UNBELIEVABLE; I loved it). So I put off reading "Bonfire" until, oh, I don't know, maybe after 9/11. By that time, home video games had become astonishingly popular, and crime rates started dropping everywhere across the nation, including New York (for which then-Mayor Giuliani took all the credit, of course). When I finally got to read it, the novel struck me as a bit dated. Not that any issues described in it with a flourish, social and otherwise, had become a thing of the past. The overall societal set of problems had shifted a little since the novel's publication, that's all.

The story is constantly balancing on the edge of political correctness, even though it never goes beyond the boundaries, not once. Even so, few other authors would dare show a book that probes so many "untouchable," "sacred-cow" issues to an editor, and few editors would touch a book of this sort with a hundred-foot pole. The advantage of being Tom Wolfe, I suppose, is that during the decades he spent being a journalist and creating his own style (starting back in the '60's), the man gradually accustomed everyone to the fact that he says outrageous things and gets away with it. The degree of outrage has increased over the years, and today Mr. Wolfe can get away (I would imagine) with saying pretty much anything, because he knows that no one will take it (or him) seriously.

It is worth remembering, while reading this novel, that its author belongs to the glorious school of Southern authors with New York careers: the crux of American literature. God bless.

In retrospect, there is no better snapshot of New York City during the 1980's than THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES. This novel completely captures the energy, and even the euphoria, which crept into city life during a decade that now seems far removed.
BONFIRE is an engrossing novel, interweaving all of the many aspects of city life, from the self-indulgences of the newly (very) rich to the struggles of the ghetto poor. Much like that proverbial first potato chip, once a reader gets a taste of this book, it is hard to stop reading until the final resolution. Wolfe writes a detailed and informative story in his typical lively style.
Anyone who wants to remember New York City during the overheated 80's will find THE BONFIRE OF THE VANITIES to be a clear snapshot of that time and that place.

Critics of Bonfire of the Vanities often say that Wolfe's epic novel is not "literary" or "high brow" enough to go down in the literary canon. I can see where these reviewers are coming from, but that does not make this novel any less entertaining. The difference between Wolfe, as opposed to an author like Jonathan Franzen, is that Franzen's novels are reflective of the psyches and personalities that make up middle-America -- essentially, Franzen has something to say about our society. Wolfe, at least to me, is more focused on telling a good story.

Not that there is anything wrong with that. While Wolfe perhaps has something to say about race and socioeconomic relations (essentially, that the rich folks on Wall Street kind of jerks and poor minorities on the street are not all that bad), Bonfire of the Vanities is more an exercise in style and pacing. It is a testament to Wolfe's structuring ability that a book this lengthy (my hardcover is over 600 pages) never feels too long-winded. This book will not change your life or the way you look at things -- it will, however, provide you with a few solid hours of great entertainment.

"The Right Stuff" by Thomas Wolfe details the manned space race between Russia and the United States. It focuses on the United States' effort to put a man into space. The story of the first seven American astronauts is told, along with a description of test pilots, scientists, and others involved with spaceflight during this time.
It is an excellent read, with just the right amount of storytelling, personalization, and technical details. The people are exposed as real people, not put on a pedestal, the way many books tend to treat historic figures. The movie version is good, the book is even better. Read this book whether you're a techie or just interested in this stage of American history.

When I was growing up, I did not want to me an astronaut. I wanted to be a ballerina. Now, with the state of both the space program and the arts, it appears that there will be neither astronauts nor ballerinas in America in the future. So in the future, children will have to dream about the past.

Tom Wolfe's THE RIGHT STUFF presents the sheer power and drive of the story. This is, after all, the book that turned Chuck Yeager from someone known primarily by airplane lovers to a bona fide Great American. I remember too how it was the movie version of this book that was anticipated to launch the John Glenn presidential campaign, the progress of which had started, it was thought, on the day he volunteered for astronaut training.

I am old enough to remember most of the events he describes, and, at least in my mind, it has captured the time and place. There are no footnotes, but obviously a lot of interviews went into this book. The big picture is accurate, even if he does get aircraft designations wrong (he confuses the Grumman F7F Tigercat and the Grumman F11F Tiger, and that F4H-1s became F-4Bs in 1962). He's got other details wrong too. But that's small stuff.

There are remarkable descriptions that have great applicability as craft examples. This includes the description of a deck landing in chapter 2, or of the testffield at Muroc in chapter 3. Chapter 1 provides an example of how to introduce terms (pushing the envelope), the effective use of repetition (the bridge coats at the funerals), Chapter 1 also shows the invocation of sensory details, with the smells of an airplane that has crashed in a swamp, and a description of the swamp itself. These descriptions arise segued not from a description of the airplane that has crashed or the pilot that has been killed, but of the feelings of the spouse of a surviving pilot at the funeral of the guy who finished off in the swamp. Such emotions are certainly a powerful opening to the book, and starting off with the wife, not with the pilot or the airplane, a non-obvious narrative approach, was used to powerful advantage.

Chapter 11 includes a remarkable an exciting scene, with Gus Grissom in the water after his capsule had landed and a series of failures leads to the capsule sinking and him almost being drowned, He runs through the scene effectively twice, once from the point of view of the literally more distant (and detached) rescue helicopter pilots and one from that of the closely involved, potentially drowning Grissom which reproduced what was going on inside his head. Now, Grisson may have talked aboiut this is an interview before his tragic death in the Apollo capsule fire, or this may all be the author's surmise. The reader does not know. But it is done effectively. As is the transition to the disappointment in the lack of post-launch recognition that followed the Grissom mishap.

When Chuck Yeager stalls and spins the NF-104 in chapter 15, it was a spectacular scene. ).

This book was my introduction to Tom Wolfe - and what an introduction it was.

The country was mired in a black hole. President Nixon had resigned the Office of the President in disgrace. There was the continuing debacle in Iran. The anti-hero was king.

Who would have guessed a book about old-fashioned heroism could capture the public's attention?

Yet that is exactly was Wolfe penned. Beginning with the early test pilots and then proceeding to NASA's Mercury program's assault on the final frontier - space. A tale of good, old-fashioned American heroism; a thought, which to many in 1979 that was foreign, or at best, long-forgotten.

The book was controversial. As a New Journalist, Wolfe inserted himself into the lives of his "characters" as each in turn becomes a major player in the space program. It was a true story that tintillated the reader's imagination. No novel could have done it better.

Beginning with an opening chapter on the terror of being a test pilot's wife, the story cuts back to the late 1940s, when Americans were first attempting to break the sound barrier. Anyone who has ever read it will never forget its Blue Uniform litany. Test pilots, we discover, are people who live fast lives with dangerous machines on the edge. I recall having to punch myself to be reminded that I was not reading a book about the stock brokerage business.

Although Wolfe's command of the English language is unparalleled, this edition is enhanced by the inclusion of images culled from Life and Look magazines, NASA and the Library of Congress. The photos chronicle the lives of the people and the social and political climate that created our country's nascent space program.

The Right Stuff is my favorite book. Tom Wolfe is my favorite author. This edition is a tribute to both. Yet more than that, it is a tribute to the people and the spirit that made this story possible.

So, I am finally reading this book by Tom Wolfe; my sister just highly recommended to me "The Electric Koolaid Acid Test", which I ordered at my library to read. Glad I found "Bonfire" on the shelf in the meantime, and to have finally started on Tom Wolfe. OMG, I am so glad I am finally reading this novel. It is beyond sophisticated and beyond hilarious (any author who makes me bust out laughing like a hyena anyway I know immediately is wonderful); what an indictment of so much of the culture and style of the '80's. Reading this novel, I think I am able to see so much (good) about the author - his culture, humor, intellect and thinking, just shining through this brilliant novel. Especially if you have grown up on the East Coast, you immediately get the style and sophistication of this writing (maybe somewhat similar too I think to the great detective writing of someone like Raymond Chandler (?). Anyway, I do not want this book to end, I am so entranced; I am LOVING Tom Wolfe!

The subject of The Bonfire of the Vanities is Tom Wolfe's creative and perfectly illustrative descriptive writing. For example, the author refers, in one scene, to a character wearing a "'F--k You' necktie." The main enjoyment in crawling through this 700-page beast, is awaiting each next colorfully described scene.

The marketing for this novel, and the aura that surrounds it, bills Bonfire as capturing the 80s. There were some period elements such as the media-circus of hot lawsuits. It also had scenes, such as the McCoy's offices for bond-trading, that felt 80s. But you can more efficiently immerse into that period by watching Network and Wall Street. Plus, the scenes with aristocrat McCoy and hotshot Assistant D.A. Kramer, were written in a style that reminded me of film from the 50s.

The transformation of Sherman McCoy is not well-developed. When it arrives it comes as a shock.

There is engaging drama and interesting plot, but nothing occurs of great significance. Only at one point, when a character describes an Edgar Allen Poe poem, does the novel rise above the milieu of its multiple intersecting plotlines.

The book is a large investment of your time. Do great descriptions and fun plots make it worth it? I think so, but only minimally so.

This was my second Tom Wolfe book and I enjoyed it even more than the first, being "A Man In Full" It amazes me how Wolfe can introduce so many characters from so many places and then some how tie them all together. This book may anger certain readers with the frequent stereotypes used by Wolfe to show New York prejudice but they are essential in understanding New York city. I personally enjoyed the theme of how many whites were afraid of blacks and were scared to travel to what seems like another city in Harlem. Wolfe also addresses the situation within the poverty stricken ghettos of New York. This book paints an accurate picture of New York sex and class and the divisions within them.

I can remember watching the movie on HBO nearly 30 years ago. It did not make all that much sense to me at the time. The book itself is almost 700 pages, and it took me several days to get through. Lots of it had to be "streamlined" to fit into a two-hour movie format. I have never been to NYC, but have watched every episode of "Mad Men". This fits hand-in-glove into the format of skirt-chasing, infidelity, pride, greed, lies, power, lust etc. I think of it as a roadmap to the Seven Deadly Sins. A bit tedious in parts, as Wolfe goes into extensive detail in setting up each character. But once you get into it, it grabs you, and near the end, you cannot put it down. The two-page epilogue is very interesting in itself. I will be passing this on to my grandson, who is a freshman in college. This book illustrates just how the real world operates, and I wish that I had it to read when I was his age. A Five Star summer reading project. P.S. John Hamm, who portrayed Don Draper in Mad Men would have been a dead ringer to play main character Sherman McCoy in the Bonfire movie.

This was the latest of the selections that my Reading Group picked out to read and I think that the overwhelming feeling was that we were left wondering what all the hype was about. Indeed, the book touched on a topic that is of interest to nearly everyone. Who doesn't like to think of shooting through space in a spacecraft? But, in reality, I think I am a generation too young to have experienced the fervor and fury the American people experienced. Tom Wolfe's narrative was entertaining in the beginning with the story of a pilot who doesn't get picked for Project Mercury, but then the middle section of the book gets quite dry and dreary. All I kept wondering was "When the heck are they going to get launched into space?" Finally, after 100 pages of tedium, we get to the actual individual space flights of the 7 astronauts and the ordeals their wives went through. This was entertaining and interesting reading which I enjoyed quite a bit. The chapters on Gus Grissom and Scott Carpenter I found fascintating since they hardly received the hero's welcome compared to John Glenn and Alan Shepard. Unfortunately, John Glenn received the lions share of the chapter when more could have been devoted to the foibles of those fellows whose flights were problematic. Overall, it was a book I am sure glad I read for its place in American history despite the problems I encountered.

UNTIL THE ENDING/EPILOGUE THIS WAS "THE BEST BOOK I EVER READ." UNBELIEVABLY SUSPENSFUL AND INSIGHTFUL, MY HEART WAS ACTUALLY POUNDING WHILE I READ THE BOOK. BUT MR. WOLFE SHOULD HAVE STOPPED BEFORE THE EPILOGUE. TO THAT POINT A POWERFUL STATEMENT HAD BEEN MADE AND SHERMAN MCCOY AND HAD BEEN EXONERATED FROM A CRIME HE DID NOT COMMIT. AFTER THE EPILOGUE, THERE IS NO CONCLUSIVE ENDING, ALTHOUGH IT IS OBVIOUS, THAT IN FEAR OF BAD REACTIONS FROM THE BLACKS, MR. WOLFE HAS WEASELED OUT AND MADE IT APPARENT THAT THE LAWYERLESS MR. MCCOY WOULD LIKELY BE UNJUSTLY CONVICTED AND SPEND 8 TO 25 IN JAIL AND MARIA, THE GOLDDIGGER AND REAL CRIMINAL WOULD ROAM THE WORLD UNSCATHED.

This book is one of the most enjoyable books that I've read. With great characters and descriptions, it is definetely a masterpiece.
The characters in the novel are downright brilliant. Each has his or her flaws, and Wolfe shows those, but not with too much severity, instead showing that we are all equal in our flaws.
The description in this book, though sometimes too much, too long, and repetitive, is generally very good and paints a beatiful picture of the scene in your mind.
The plot is very involved, but not so much that it confuses you, and more than enough to keep you interested. The ending is very surprising and very riveting, and is a perfect ending to a already great book.
Highly recommended to all.

Many will remember the movie made of this. My advice? Don't. I was put off this book for quite some time because of having seen the film, but, finally decided to give it a go (despite having a paperbackl edition with the film characters on the cover...) This book is an example of what a meticulous, fearless and talented writer of prose can come up with in response to the world around him. While being a great 'page-turner' as far as plot goes, Wolfe manages, through a complex web of ironies and double ironies, to examine humanity as a social creature in a certain time and place. Hands down one of the most enteratining novels that I have ever read, and definitely the best rendering of modern New York City in fiction! This paperback was so ubiquitous I waited 10 years to reluctantly read it, and only because it was one of the only books on the shelf where I was staying. Boy, was I rewarded with this compulsively readable, suspenseful, razor-sharp story. For social satire to be so fiendishly plotted is a real treat and this story will have you racing to its inexorable conclusion.

Damn it, Tom. You wrote the novel of the decade. Do it again! This work stands beside the works of Drieser, Fitzgerald, Salinger, Lewis, Heller, and Pynchon. That must scare you. Please do not be afraid: work, stand, and deliver. Do not be fear failure, for you have already had success which will far outlive you. Review: this was the "novel of the eighties" which will be "studied" as such. Mr. Wolfe's writings are an admixture of Sinclair Lewis and Hunter Thompson, yet unique. It is such fun to read and, then again, to re-read for texture and content. If you have seen the movie, please forgive the author for "selling the rights".

It's always fun to read a best seller from almost 20 years ago, especially one that was proclaimed as something of a classic at the time. It's even more enjoyable to discover that Tom Wolfe's The Bonfire of the Vanities proves worthy of its acclaim even with the absence of cell phones, email and instant messaging.

I mention the technology only because such communications dinosaurs as pay phones play significant roles in the story of how an auto accident involving a bond trader and a pedestrian teenager gets complicated by his mistress, a political hack of a DA, the resentful prosecutor, a drunken opportunist of a reporter, society matrons (including the bond trader's wife), a media manipulating black activist/minister, egotistical Wall Street executives, courthouse lawyers and a wealth of other characters.

The title says it all. No character in the book operates without his or her ego getting in the way of things and like a small fire that gets too close to the charcoal lighter and then the gas tank... well, you get the idea.

Forget the nonsensical movie they made of this, as far as I'm concerned that film exists solely for the purpose of demonstrating that Tom Hanks can make a bad decisions once every decade or so. This novel is a delight, one that should be rediscovered by a generation of readers that was in elementary school back in the 80's.

Airplanes, astronauts, NASA, government, top secret missions, etc. You name it, it's there. This is exactly the type of book a guy would even hesitate to pick off a bookshelf. For a girl well, it can be contemplated, given that she is completely into emotional drama and maybe a bit of political science, as I was. In the beginning of the novel I thought the book was confusing. However, it is definitely the book to read if you have been in the military at one point or another, or are a NASA geek.

It is of course an interesting perspective coming from the pilots themselves and not their representatives: the press. Tom Wolfe's frankness and acceptation of reality sheds light into the harsh world that astronauts had to live in. They worship legends like Chuck Yeager, telling stories of their youth as if peering into their lives through a looking hole. The one thing I am certainly, truly exhilarated about in this book is the imagery Wolfe uses to recreate the scenes. I feel that by far my favorite part was when Wolfe demonstrates to the reader what fears pilots face when landing their planes. He uses several situations and people to describe the experiences and thoughts the pilots are going through at a certain time. In one minute only, they have so many different thoughts going on that it is almost unfathomable and obviously mind blowing to read so many emotions running through them all at once. An example of this is when he says, "Just look at the beast..." and then shows his reaction versus the pilot's.

Most of this story is made up of dialogue and so it is easy to follow and imagine the scene as it plays out. He varies with the type of language he uses frequently. He shifts from geeky airplane terms to informal speaking between commoners to absolute informal as in using bad words. This helps the story to flow well and clears up grey areas in the storyline that one doesn't really understand till they read what the pilots have to say. Another good tool that Wolfe uses is moving through the story chronologically so to help the reader feel as if they are not lost between time zones.

Sure, everyone you speak to who has read the book will say something like "an exhilarating flight into fear, love, beauty and fiery death ... magnificent (said by the People)," or "It's magic ... the best book I have read in the last ten years (said by the Chicago Tribune)." Truth is I will say the same as them. This book was exciting and breathtaking. It felt as if one was in the plane along side with pilot, watching his every move and biting their lips away in fear that the pilot may die in any second and Wolfe would remove the character out of his novel. But, I advise that you DO NOT read this book if you are a reader who likes spending their time on romantic novels or light reads with clear humor. Although, this is so, if you are willing to spend time to understand the complexities and the beauty that Wolfe has written about, I assure you that you will not regret the experience or the roller coaster ride that comes along with this book.

Using Wolfe's cake analogy, this book is one hell of a serving of a multi-layered cake. It is funny, farcical, tragic, satiric and informative. We are giving the wonderful New York landscape at its panoramic best, even to its underbelly in The Bronx Courthouse.
Sherman Mc.Coy becomes a victim of vicious circumstance, not only that we are given a glimpse into the machinations and manipulations of those who take advantage of his unfortunate position.
It is a morality tale, but one is left wondering what Sherman, a Master of the Universe, invite this upon himself: basically not listening to his better instinct of immediately reporting an accident to the police. He had become blinded by his love in an extra-marital relationship.
A real treat to read.

Pivotal in the characterization of this book is the accuracy in which every thought, action and even accent is described. The author leaves absolutely no margin for your imagination to alter the experience of the story. This is why you are living the satirical story of Mr. Wolfe portraying New York by its essentials: power, racial issues and money. That's all there is to it.
Sherman McCoy, whom you are given ample opportunity to hate, but really cannot hate completely, finds out that life is extremely fragile when you have everything everybody else wants. One misstep, or in his case one wrong turn in his pricey Mercedes, shows him literally and figuratively a more colorful New York than he has ever seen. Being terrified even on the 'safest' streets of New York, the Bronx appears before him like the nightmare he never had, accompanied by his mistress with the southern accent, Maria. Trying desperately to return to safe Manhattan, he is involved in a hit-and-run which is the start of a series of events that change his entire world. The mighty must fall, as seen from the Bronx. Justice must be done, seen from the assistant DA (who in fact has other motives). Headlines must scream, as seen from the press. All want a piece of McCoy, all want power, all want money.
Everybody who reads this book cannot deny finding many truths in it, about America, about wealth and about life all intertwined in an exiting story. Herein we find the strength of storytelling of Tom Wolfe. Read this book.

This is one of those books where you can't wait to get home from work (you might even cancel a date) to get back to. Great plot and believable characters...Tom Wolfe really gets you into their minds and their emotions. I really liked it from start to finish. And, like so many novels out today, it wasn't corny. It was very believable..even the way it ended with Shreman McCoy still dealing with his problems.
My only criticism would be that sometimes Tom Wolfe gets into some LONG oratories or explanations which, often, I skipped over because they were tol laborious.
On the other hand, I LOVED the social parties...Wolfe's description of the "ha ha ha" and the "heh heh heh" was really a good laugh.
This is one of the very few books that I'll probably read again.

"The Bonfire of the Vanities" is a good book...one of those books that are enjoyable to read and educate you in some way at the same time. Richly drawn with a well-developed plot line and memorable characters (and caricatures), this is a book that should stand the test of time.

What I enjoyed most about this book was how well the scenes, settings and characters were drawn by Wolfe. He has a gift for capturing the essence of a time and place...something he does quite well in "The Bonfire of the Vanities" for different sides of New York City in the 1980s.

This is a great and memorable book.

This is a page turner, par excellence. Most media descriptions of astronauts and space exploration are bland at best. This is history as narrative and you never want it to end. The astronauts themselves come to life as never before or since. Mr. Wolfe captures the era perfectly. It is as if you are right there with the whole cast of characters in the space program. This is exciting stuff, unlike the endless boring coverge of space exploration on television that dominated the era. This is the real stuff. Mr. Wolfe's masterful description of what it is like to land a jet fighter on a aircraft carrier will stay with you forever. Sadly, The Right Stuff has to end, and Mr. Wolfe admits that he could have continued on and on but had to end it somewhere. I am sorry that was true.

As my title states, a smart person doesn't make a great writer of fiction. Through reading this novel I saw that Wolfe a lot of interesting ideas and is a rather well-studied individual, but his execution in this novel his terrible. He repeatedly destroys the momentum of the story with excessive detail. I found that I could often times skip fifteen pages and not miss anything but more pointless rambling about things that add nothing to the story. For example, Wolfe would often give us the salary of a character, then list how much he spends a month for food, clothes, cars, etc. There is another point where he goes into a irrelevant discussion about Christopher Marlowe. I could picture Wolfe jumping up and down, shouting, "HEY, LOOK WHAT I KNOW! I CAN HAVE A DISCUSSION ABOUT EARLY MODERN ENGLISH DRAMATISTS!!" Also, while I understand that this is a satire, the character development is poor and there is not a single individual that the reader can bring themselves to feel sorry for except for Henry Lamb and his mother. The rest of the time you feel like you are just reading about a bunch of selfish bigots. This could have been an engaging novel about the socio-political situation in New York City in the late 1980s. But instead it turned into a self-indulgent monstrosity.

However, I would love to attend a lecture given by Wolfe. He seems like he would be an interesting person to listen to. But as a writer of fiction, he just doesn't cut it for me.

... this book has all the trappings of class while never surrendering its large-scale consumer appeal as "fiction." BOTV has several dimensions - on one level, it's a satirical look at the dog-eat-dog world of upper-crust 1980s NYC, where power, greed and rabid statusmongering are the rule. Even if you just stay on that level, Bonfire is a great read - alternately very funny and sobering, though the prevailing dismal view of human nature may depress you.

On another level, BOTV has something to say about American society, human nature and, I think, the nature of desires themselves. Even the most hard-nosed conservative will wince at Wolfe's unrelentingly cynical view of black "civil rights leaders" who invariably turn out to be corrupt (interestingly, BOTV has not a single positive black character - unless you count Lamb, who's dead). And even liberals like me cringe at his description of made-for-TV "mass demonstrations" orchestrated by know-nothing urbanites.

Political sensibilities aside however, BOTV shows that even those who seem one-dimensionally "bad" to their antagonists often have at least a glimmer of decency. It's also a poignant commentary on what desires are real and which ones are products of the lives we lead; the hope for love versus the longing for exotic and dapper clothes, for instance. If you wanna think about it, this book can do us all a lot of good.

... and heck, if you don't, it's still a good way to kill some time.

I was born & raised in New York and lived there until 1987. This book perfectly captures the culture & attitudes of the city, its shrill power politics and opportunism and hypocrisy.
Wolfe has called this a "social novel," a once popular form, now less so.
The social novel is sociological, as opposed to psychological. It paints with a broad brush. Its "main character" is an entire city, or profession, or period in history (rather than the psychological novel's narrow focus on a single individual's inner thoughts & feelings).
This book is funny and truthful. And despite its thickness, a quick read, because it's also an exciting page-turner.

I had seen the movie long ago and have watched it more than once. I grew up during the space race and remember it well. The book had more material than the movie and it was all interesting behind the scenes stuff. I was never sure whether the author approved of the space program or not but he sure was well informed on how it ticked.

Tom Wolfe does a wonderful job of displaying true feelings and thoughts to the reader in this unique story of the true realities of life in New York City.
One of the merits of the book is how easily you can relate to the characters, how truely real they are and how real they react to each situation is how many of us could see ourselves reacting to the same situation. He does this by having people deal with things that they think about only in their heads, but would never say out loud. Another merit of the book is the ability of the author to create a true essence of New York City and of the American way. At the beginning of the book the author descibes a situation taking place in the heart of New York City. "Half full! Half consumed!Somebody has just thrown a half-eaten jar of Hellman's mayonaise at him (the Mayor)!" The idea that the author has the object that is thrown be something so real something that we all know and all use, shows how American and how normal the author's ideas are so that the reader is able to relate.
One weakness of the book is how nothing seems to ever turn out right. That is not real lfe and in that aspect the story is never very fulfilling until the end, when by the time you finally get there and after all the bad things you've gone through with the characters it doesn't quite seem like enough good to fulfill the reader with in the end. It lacks the aspect of true happiness in the reader, making you think that life is all full of bad things and there is no hope for the good in people. And by the time you finally reach the good, it is so unexpected and uncommon that you don't even eralize it is there. You have to go through a tremendous amount of pain and hatred and it doesn't seem the happiness is worth all the pain.
Overall i think that the book was very long and had a lot of unecessary detail the reader could have lived without. I only suggest this book if you are willing to face your own mind and the thoughts that you keep inside. It is very prejudice and stereotypical, but tHat is what makes it as good as it is.

WOW !! The master writer is at it again !
The Right Stuff is one of Tom Wolf's very best work.
This book is so good that it is hard to put down. The story of America's best fliers, John Glenn, Chuck Yeager, Guss Grissom and many others, is not only terrific but also griping.
Tom Wolfe gets personal, in a very positive way, in introducing us to the wifes of these test pilots and future astronauts. By doing it, he is telling us what it must of have been like to be the wife of a man who decides to take on the most dangerous profession in the world for the glory of it all.
It brings us back to a time when real heroes were very much part of our livelyhood.
He is also very accurate with his characters and timeline.
He is detailed oriented and has done extensive research to make his book come alive.
Breathtaking and thrilling.
A MUST READ.

Lot of useful reviews here. No one mentions Wolfe's 24-page introduction, 'Stalking the Billion-Footed Beast,' which is excellent in itself as an overview of the alleged death of the novel, The New Journalism, non-fiction v. fiction & his own evolution as a writer. The introduction is worth a read on its own if you're a journalism student, a would-be or actual writer or just interested in the publishing world. As for the rest of the book, it's excellent. Wolfe is a master of the set piece, the extended vignette beautifully observing a situation or person. He is not so good at endings, which is why I picked four stars rather than five. I felt identically about his later "A Man in Full," and it didn't stop me enjoying the heck out of the book. If you enjoy his fiction, his non-fiction is well worth checking out as great examples of very controlled, observant reporting & writing. I particularly enjoyed "From Bauhaus to Our House," an extended essay about modern architecture, and "The Painted Word," ditto on modern art.

I opened this book with a limited interest in the Space Race, jet pilots, or Tom Wolfe, but have become fascinated by all three. This is an extremely well written, exciting, fast paced novel that takes place during the early days of space flight and focuses on the personalities who drove our pursuit to beat the Russians. It contains subtle criticism of the space program and the people inside it, which is a nice subplot to the story, but the adventure and energy is what makes this a great book. I will again read Wolfe and want to learn more about the history of the space program now, and when a book inspires these kind of reactions I can not help but recommend it to anyone who asks for a suggestion.

Tom Wolfe who definitely ranks as one of my favourite authors wrote this brilliant book about the Mercury Space Program. He illustrates perfectly how and why these seven astronauts were hailed as heroes, the setting for the story and what made these men tick. It's also very funny and can only really be described as Intellectual Top Gun. The one criticism I have about the book is that Tom Wolfe could have concluded the book by telling us what happened to these men and how the space program developped, even if he does it in a small epilogue. Nonetheless, it's hugely entertaining. You'll enjoy it.

Tom Wolfe tells an epic story of how seven test pilots pushed the outside of the envelope to become the first astronauts. Told with such energy, this story captivates the reader and tells a true tale of bravery, imagination, and ingenuity that paved the way for the Gemini & Apollo programs.

The reason for the four stars and my only complaint about this book is Tom Wolfe's overwhelming dislike for Gus Grissom. Though it was originally believed that Gus was responsible for the loss of Liberty Bell, it was later proven that he was not at fault. Since the fault was found to be in the hatch with explosive bolts, this design was deleted from future spacecraft in lieu of an inward opening, bolted hatch. Ironically, this became part of a tragic chain of events that claimed the lives of Gus and his crew mates Roger Chaffee and Ed White aboard Apollo 1 during a plugs-out test. Unfortunately, this dislike carries over to the movie based on this book. Most people who have seen the movie or have read this book paint an unrealistic picture of Gus.

Overall, this book is excellent. It captures the bravery and attitudes of the Mercury Seven and keeps the reader engaged and excited to turn the page.

When entering the competitive, cut-throat professional world, where stories abound of the dorm-mate who just landed the six figure job at Goldman Sachs, "The Bonfire of the Vanities" just may help you maintain the precious altruism that you grew up with.

This book is honest. It's a story of how people become when they allow their ego to be defined by their over-compensation, and it's not pretty. 'Bonfire' is witty and human. Mr. Wolfe does a fantastic job of developing his characters into people you'll care about, and builds their stories until you'll just cringe over the situations they put themselves into. In the end you'll thank God you're not them.

This is one of the best stories I've ever read. It's intelligent, hysterical, very cynical and yet, so very real. Not only did it capture my attention during its 700pages -to the point I just couldn't go to sleep - but also I actually felt sad once I realized there was no more book to read and that it was over. I had become so attached to the characters - it was almost as if I had become one of their friends - and also I went so into it that I was dragged into its own pace and timing. In the end (don't freak out, I'm not gonna say how it ends) I realized that I 'd become agitated myself as action took place at such a high speed -as if I had been there all the time: if a book is capable of making a person perspire and agitate in his armchair and laugh loudly and histerically, so hard that he is unable to continue reading, then it must be a masterpiece. And this is most certainly one.

Bonfire of the Vanities has long been hailed as one the greatest (the greatest?) American novels of the 1980's, and its accolades bear little use repeating. Nevertheless, a new look at this classic novel provides ample proof that while many aspects of society have changed in the nearly two decades since Bonfire was published, a great many other have, sadly, not. Just add Starbucks, the Internet, and cellular phones; you'll find that the world described by this novel is very much alive in Gotham today.

Literary celebrity and brilliant self-promoter Tom Wolfe did meticulous research on both the upper crust and under belly of Reagan Era New York City to craft this incisive, complicated, dense, and comic tale of racial unrest, political bickering, and blind sighted American bourgeois insularity. Darting from the dilapidated housing projects of the South Bronx to the gilded penthouses of Park Avenue, Wolfe spins his tale around the fictional personage of Sherman McCoy: a WASP wall street powerhouse, a self-described "Master of the Universe", and a man who due to an accidental and tragic visit to the South Bronx ends up igniting the collective and seething racial and socioeconomic tensions vibrating beneath New York's polarized population. Mr. Wolfe has painted a rich and multifaceted ethnic landscape to navigate, avoiding any and all simplistic cultural syllogisms in lieu of both character and cultural specificity, with all of the complexity and contradictions that come with it. Though it has a Dramatis Personae the size of a Dickens novel, none of the characters are turned into caricature; indeed, every individual is sympathetic in Wolfe's world, though none are overtly heroic or free of troubling ethical transgression. It is a testimony to Wolfe's skill as a writer that, though this southern WASP in the famous white suit bears little relation to many of Bonfire's most colorful characters, he always presents them with conviction and believability. His detailed descriptions of various social and professional rituals at various levels of New York life give the reader the detail needed to invest imaginatively in the lives of the many characters populating Bonfire's New York. Whether it be the perpetually caffeinated barking of a Wall Street Investment Firm's trading floor, or the grinding, discouraging monotony of the legal machinations in the South Bronx courthouse, the reader is no doubt given the impression that this is how it really was. The zenith of this is an extended chapter in which Wolfe intricately (and often hilariously) describes an uber-posh dinner party at a palatial 5th Avenue apartment. One can almost taste the foie gras pate and Dom Perignon.

A lesser writer could let all this detail weigh him down and cause an otherwise interesting book to have all the buoyancy of sunken treasure chest. Bonfire's prose eschews this particularly precarious trap. The narrative often oscillates between traditional 3rd person description and 1st person expression. Depending on which character is being focused on at any given moment, their own point-of-view on the narrative is seamlessly woven into the prose allowing the story to take on an emotional immediacy and deeper sense of perspective. Most importantly, the plot itself is a thoroughly designed piece of machinery that allows Wolfe to go on his descriptive tangents without harming the book's internal feng-shui. Indeed, the story's momentum is built on this specificity. While the general points in the storyline could be churned out in any Law & Order episode, Bonfire's power cannot be reduced to a simple plot description. It is not about the guilt or innocence of it's characters. Instead, the author is putting a whole era on trial. No doubt Wolfe does have an agenda (it would be foolish and impossible to imagine any writer worth his salt without one) but it only is apparent in an overarching view of the work as a whole, and is never overtly didactic.

This being said, Bonfire of the Vanities is a book about the dangers of a stratified society, in which an egregiously affluent echelon of the population ignores the clearly deteriorating circumstances of less-fortunates around them. Equally dangerous are the politicians, public servants, "community leaders" and "journalists" who, in order to appease the mob and advance their careers, exploit these deeply troublesome socio-economic tensions with shallow displays of self-righteous verbosity and hyped-up social hysteria. What makes Bonfire such a classic is the way Wolfe presents these social problems as a result of the elaborate Rube Goldberg device that was (is?) contemporary American metropolitan society. This is illustrated with astute clarity by his representation of established government bureaucracy's engagment with the ever-churning melting pot of American culture, as typified by the extremely volatile ethnic smorgasbord of New York City. Running parallel and counterpoint to this is the way the Press uses these often complex problems to advance it's own agenda and increase it's profit-margin. The characters and plot of the book move like a machine, each person doing what is generally expected of him given his social position, occupation and (less so) personal commitments. Nevertheless, the problems of the characters, both lowly and highbrow, are not easily resolved. The real culprit is the excesses of the 1980's, and they have never been presented with as much clarity, insight, heart and humor as in The Bonfire of the Vanities. Of course, the lessons of the book were hardly learned, and America today has yet to escape the problems that Tom Wolfe so exquisitely and satirically addresses in this masterwork of the contemporary American novel.

...this is the book you should take. The characters are so entertaining and the plot(s) so interesting that it will divert you and keep you engrossed all the way to Hong Kong. The only drawback will be when you have to stifle your laughter! The mixture of types that make New York what it is are all depicted with wry humor and a keen eye for fakery. No one sees through people's social poses like Tom Wolfe! He even presciently created the character of Reverend Bacon before our real life version, Al Sharpton came on the scene.

I can understand how this book was such a milestone. True genius, in the journalistic style--for portraying so well the status and money-obsessed nature of New York, which still holds true today. Wolfe does a terrific, and I mean really terrific, job at describing the city's political climate and how easily people can be taken advantage of once power and money are thrown into the mix.
Each character's intense need to better his or her own situation is at the center of how each of them relate to the story. In that, the story is essentially a description of how five New Yorkers cross paths and manage to further and better their personal situations, at the expense of a rich Wall Street trader's criminal mistake and inward feelings of guilt. Even though Sherman McCoy's character is portrayed as your typical snooty financial industry professional, the way in which he is brought down is dismaying in itself. He is used as a scapegoat for the ills of the White Establishment by a crooked, black political figure (using the hypocrisy of the church to better himself); used as "the Great White Defendant" by an insecure, self-critical assistant DA to make his career as a trial lawyer; used as centerpiece of a tabloid story to build a shallow, alcoholic reporter's journalist career; used to displace blame by a promiscuous, sleek money-hungry trophy wife... The Bonfire shows the lengths people will go to in order to get ahead and the lack of underlying trust for others, irregardless of money and status. The book is a lesson in city life, opportunism, greed, and a fundamental lesson in our very nature and how we operate, in the strict, economic sense of the term.
In another vein, the plot takes some movie-like twists and turns that dont necessarily work well in writing. Overall, an amazing piece of work, but seems very well suited to the screen more than anything else...I still have to rent the movie!!! Overall, a gripping and very accurate rendition of the city lives we all dream of living.

Iam more than happy that I finally read the book, although I knew about it for a long time. during my free-time I read a lot and this book was a terrific read, one of the best books I ever picked up.
it is about the fall of sherman mccoy, a wall street 'wunderkind'. one night, he and his 'foxy love' take the wrong exit of the freeway and find themselves 'trapped' in the bronx. by accident, they hit a joung black male. the hit-and-run causes them unthinkable trouble and from now on, everything goes straight downhill. simultaneously, many other people take advantage of their doom. foremost, the journalist p. fallow and rev. bacon. the book is full of interesting, funny, but also bad characters (especially mccoy itself who is indescribably arrogant, the english journalist as well as the slimy, sycophant kramer and the 'influencial' rev. bacon to name but a few) and wolfe provides an excellent description of ny in the late 80's. however, due to the fact that iam german I do not know whether everything is true or a slightly exaggerated description. but I perosnally think it doesn't matter at all because the message is clear: in an achievement-oriented society everyone is only interested in her/his own benefits and 'walks over dead bodies' to reach more and more. of course, it is stereotyping but I safely assume that this is true and undenieable at least to a certain degree.
the bonfire of the vanities is a bitter-sweet, satiric, funny, dramatic, and enthralling novel everyone ought to read. maybe one of the finest american novels of recent times. what I liked most is the fact that there are no 'real heroes' and almost every character shows its dreadful, abhorrent side. of course, the book has its lenght but its worthwile to proceed because the pace is always high and so many amazing things occur although one might correctly guess what is supposed to happen next.
moreover, wolf's writing is great, in particular the different linguistic details in terms of dialects, abusive language etc. are absolutely fabulous. with a clear conscience, I highly recommend this book...

This book holds up well, as the 90's on Wall Street make the 80's look like a bear market! Greed has just moved to the suburbs and purchased a sport utility vehicle. A fascinating read, gripping,and with a plot that predicted the front page spiced up by Tom Wolfe's original and witty observations. By the way, I met Tom Wolfe on the Delta shuttle soon after this book was published, and what a gentlemen. He couldn't have been more gracious as I nattered on about Bonfire and some of his other books. Tom, another book please!!

One often hears people describe this book as "the definitive novel of the Eighties," and I expected it to seem as much when I began reading it in 2002. What I found was that nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, much like "A Man In Full," which I read immediately afterwards, this novel is simply about Americans. But unlike other popular American writers (e.g., Tom Clancy), Wolfe treats his characters as human beings with flaws, and no more control over their own destinies than the vast majority of the people of the rest of the world. I think what Wolfe is ultimately getting at is the "arbitrariness of fate." Americans, as the last products of Western civilization, are conditioned largely to believe that if they only do certain things a certain way in life and make themselves believe in this way of doing things, they can exercise control over their futures. As such, Americans more than any other people tend to live "in the future." Yet, as Wolfe so eloquently shows, myriad different unforeseen things can happen in anyone's life, including an American's, that can almost instantly shatter the illusions built up over a lifetime -- illusions that often lead Americans into complacency about themselves and the world. It is quite extraordinary the way Wolfe develops stories and characters. He is unusual in the sense that in his books, the "good guys" don't always win and the "bad guys" often come out on top. You simply can never predict what will happen, and that makes the stories so much more compelling and engaging. You feel like you are living within the "real life" of a given character when you are reading about him/her. I look forward to many more brilliant reads courtesy of Tom Wolfe.

Author Tom Wolfe has given the public the consumate view of America's early Astronaut and NASA programs. Although twenty-five years old at the time of this writing "The Right Stuff" is a book unparalleled! I read the book after I saw the movie of the same name and believe that it was an accurate rendition of the story that Wolfe has portrayed.

At 436 pages, the book will not be a completely detailed driven historical narrative on the subject, but Wolfe provides crucial insight into the backgrounds, lives, and personalities of the candidates, Astronauts, and key NASA personnel. Nothing else needs to be said. A great read! I rate this book at five stars. I also recommend Alan Shepard's book "Moon Shot" as a follow-up to this text.

This book is a great way to aquaint yourself with one of the best--certainly the most exciting--contemporary American writer. The wealth of detail and penetrating insight into the origins of the space program, the men who rode the rockets, and their subsequent lionization make this book highly enjoyable.

My only complaint--and it's a small one--is that toward the end it gets a little bit repetitive. Wolfe has a couple of metaphors that he extends through the entire book (the "pyramid" of status among test pilots, the astronaut as modern "single-combat warrior"). In fact, these are the heart of the book and give some of the deepest insight into the space race, but after 300 pages you might be like, ok--I get it.

I think Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test was a better book, but if you think that the 60's counterculture was a big waste of time and youth (and you've never partaken of its elements), you'll like this one better.

With the Martha Stewarts, the Tyco/Dennis Kozlowskis, the Enron/Jeffrey Skillings of the world grabbing every headline in the business world, this masterpiece by Tom Wolfe once again appears to be an important cautionary tale of ego, greed, and megalomania, nearly 20 years after its original publication.
Wolfe is a master at providing rich characterization alongside marvelous social commentary. Lovers of Wolfe's other works will not be disappointed. He's captured the best and worst elements of New York City and all of its excesses, and wove it into a powerful tale.

This is the first Tom Wolfe novel I've read, and I had a preconceived notion of southern literature along the lines of Styron or Faulkner. This novel is more Olivia Goldsmith than Carson McCullers, and I have to admit I loved it. Wolfe's detailed inner dialogues were addicting, and I followed each of the characters with varying degrees of sympathy, admiration or disgust, but never boredom. He describes the world of his story to such an exact amount of detail that I feel like I could now write a novel of New York in the '80's (or at least Tom Wolfe's version of it). I was hoping desperately for a neat and happy ending, and I was both pleasantly surprised and disappointed with the resolution. Quick, satisfying read.

My boss lent me this book in about 1982. He also had just invited me to become a member of the Southern California Soaring Club (gliders). For me, it was the most important and inspiring book of its decade. As a kid, the astronauts were, to me, mythic figures who risked their lives to prove what we were worth as Americans. Several of them died in the process. The space race was not some society social. These guys embodied what President Kennedy said, that "...We do not do these things because they are easy. We do them because they are hard." That, to me, epitomizes the meaning of the term, The Right Stuff. Kennedy's statement resonated with me at the age of nine. Tom Wolfe's book brought me down from the clouds right to ground zero. All the faults and foibles of the astronauts, and the process of becoming one, grabbed me as incredibly real and authentic. It also convinced me that heroes often don't have names like Smith and Jones. And they all don't look like Gregory Peck. And that their wives sacrificed so much, and kept their best face forward, where others would have collapsed under the weight. It is also an incredibly funny book (the red boots, and other anecdoetes).
This is inspiring nonfiction of the highest order. It was the near prospect of imminent death that brought it all together. They were modern samurai. It was a huge gamble, and we all went for it. Other reviewers have commented elequently on Tom Wofle's prodigious writing talent, so I will leave it there. Bottom line, you can count on one hand novels that captured the full depth and breadth of intense emotion that surrounded the space race of the 1960s. Particularly in the late 70s and early 80s. Jim Lovell's Lost Moon is a good example.
Those were heady years, and I wish to God we could have them again, today. Compared with today, the years of the space race were the best years of our lives. And Wolfe captured all those emotions brilliantly. For me, it was America's finest hour. When we sat around the kitchen table and watched Neil Armstrong set foot on the Moon, it was, for me at least, the crowning achievement of the human race. I am thankful to have witnessed it, live. I will treasure that memory forever.

'The Right Stuff' investigates the beginnings of the American space program. In particular, it follows the stories of the seven astronauts in Project Mercury. According to Wolfe, the intent of this book was to pry inside the minds and motivations of America's astronauts. He has succeeded, and with gripping clarity and storytelling flair.

The lives of the Mercury Seven and their families are weaved into a background of Cold War politics, media sensationalism and unspoken military social codes. Wolfe's writing shows a mastery of selective detail. The personal quirk of one of the astronauts might lie side-by-side with a historical fact that would seem obscure by the pen of a less talented writer. Carefully selected impressions like these blend together to paint a heady and comprehensive picture of the characters behind the early space program. Indeed, I felt as if I'd finished a book twice its size (in a good way!)

This is a highly recommendable introduction to Wolfe's writing.

One of the most important novels of the 1980s Tom Wolfe's "Bonfire of the Vanities" gives us a very realistic portrayal of New York during that period.

But realism, tinged by Wolfe's own outrageous characters, and his relentless satire. While there may be nice things to say about both, Wolfe needs to realize that sometimes, saying little is the best way forward.

And yet,Wolfe fails to make a statement with the book. The reason he is not ranked with Swift as satirist is specially because of this. Swift had a vision, a way he wanted the world to be, and besides, he was far more imaginative than Wolfe could ever hope to be. Wolfe's satire is limited by his reportial aspirations; Swift went so much further and took his to an artistic, and almost prophetic level.

And finally, Wolfe isn't even the best satirist in America. John Updike offers far more power in the last of his "Rabbit" novels, and does so as he provides other things.

But as a novel, the book falls flat. The badly overdone characters work well when used for satire alone, but are too shallow and clunky to sustain a story as long as this one. Characters so one dimensional that they serve as excellent entertainment, but not if we are to gain any real pleasure out of the book. And the constant emphasis given things, as he did in his second novel, makes teh novel that much less appealing. Thomas Pynchon resorts to outrageous characterization too, but notice how skilfully that is done, how that feels like the magnification of a real person's feelings. Tom Wolfe, the other Thomas, can't do that, or will not do that.

The best part of the book was the end, the only part that felt inspired and original. When everything is taken away from him and how he reacts, that was the only part of the book in which Sherman McCoy shows a side of him that's different from what he did before. You wish the whole book had been this taut and unpredictable.

When I first read this book, I didn't like it. It did grow on me and in retrospect I saw it was some of the best satire done in decades. But I think the actual book itself is so heavy and so full of genuinely mercenary and dishonorable people that it makes you want to hold it at arm's length. This is a tough read, and it dwells in themes that by nature are not pleasant. What it DOES achieve is an ultra-realistic (and growing moreso by the year) illustration of how society really works.

"The Right Stuff" brings the dawn of the space age to the broadest of audiences. Written in a sharp, entertaining style, Wolfe combines the science and the drama of the Mercury program to create a book that you won't want to put down. This book has the right stuff in all respects. Highly recommended.

Owen Zupp
Author: '50 Tales of Flight'
50 Tales of Flight: From Biplanes to Boeings

Tom Wolfe provides a very realistic look into life. Wolfe's style of writing is very refreshing: colloquial speech and dialogue make the characters very easy to relate to. Sherman McCoy is not your average blue-collar worker, and he may even spur jealousy and anger from readers. But it becomes difficult not to emphathize with him through his struggles and in the end. Wolfe also provides impeccable description of emotions and feelings, even something as simple as a hangover: "The telephone blasted Peter Fallow awake inside an egg with the shell peeled away and only the the membranous sac holding it intact. Ah! The membranous sac was his head, and the right side of his head was on the pillow, and the yolk was as heavy as mercury, and it rolled like mercury, and it was pressing down on his right temple and his right eye and his right ear. If he tried to get up to answer the telephone, the yolk, the mercury, the poisoned mass, would shift and roll and rupture the sac, and his brains would fall out. (p.164)"
However, the arrangement of the chapters and different stories is very fragmented; there doesn't seem to be any organization other than, of course, a loose chronological unfolding of events. It is not difficult to keep track of what's going on, but it becomes very frustrating when attempting to try to tie every chapter or section to the others.
Overall, this book is decent, but there may be a few major downfalls that will prevent everyone from enjoying it.

Read or re-read this page-turner, novel of the complex ethnic and social structure of New York City, before the Wall Street bubble, and the reader becomes enthralled with the storyline. The different worlds of this city explode - the high life of a married Wall Street bond trader and some battle-ready residents of Harlem intercept - when the Wall Street broker's expensive Mercedes, bearing his mistress, literally collides with a young, Harlem resident. Tom Wolfe is a master of delivering the inner most thought that motivate the ambitions of those who have arrived and "those who wish to" in this superb tale about New York City. THE BONFIRES OF THE VANITIES is a classic masterpiece.

In the early '80s, I was to graduate from school and got interested in flying for the US Navy. My mother sent a copy of T. Wolfe's book hoping to sway my dangerous intent and take a 'real' job. WRONG. About 9 months later I was soloing over Corpus Christi Bay and on my way to flying Navy jets.
Wolfe has written an epic that spans from the early days of flight test through the beginning of the US manned space program. It will increase the heart rate of aviators, aviation buffs and armchair pilots/astornauts. I highly recommend that anyone remotely interested in aviation/space read this book. While it may not be accurate to the smallest detail, the overall scope and feel for a era gone by can never be or has ever been captured in the history books.
Regarding Gus Grissom, new facts are coming to light that will clear his reputation. Wolfe does hammer Gus in the book about what was known at the time Wolfe wrote "The Right Stuff". However, all the research and reading that I have done, Gus was probably the smartest engineer and best test pilot of the M-7 astronauts . He had a reputation of being a real nuts and bolts engineer and a hard nose pilot. He could handle any situation while flying experitmental aircraft or on the ground discussing craft/engine design with NASA's engineers. If any one has ever seen the old NASA films of the Apollo program, when Gus is doing the radio tests on that fateful day, he really gives the engineers hell from the capsule owing to poor communication on the radios "Jesus Christ, we can't talk between three building, how the hell are we going to talk on the moon." Classic Gus. Ironically, when Apollo One caught fire moments later, the hatch was redesigned not to repeat the same incident that happened to Gus in Liberty Bell 7 - and Gus, Chaffee and White paid the ultimate price.
Read this book. It is one of the best books I have ever read and was a real inspiration during my Navy days and beyond.
Bondo

This book is just a thoroughly enjoyable read. Funny, exciting, charming, moving; what more could you want? It does certainly personalize the astronauts, but I do not agree that it cuts these heroes down to size, as some other reviewers have suggested. On the contrary, Mr. Wolfe's theme is that these men really are heroes, albeit thoroughly human ones. He does, however, let us know that there are a lot of other men out there who are just as heroic, without the acclaim. Don't miss this one!

Beautiful writing and characterization, but I couldn't stand them - quit half way through because you know just they are going to get what they deserve, which is fine, but not much fun to read. No strong women characters.

As good as "The Right Stuff" is as a movie, the book is even better. Thomas Wolfe's account of post war American test pilots and the first American astronauts is frank, amusing, moving and ultimately triumphant. Wolfe humanzies the cocky heroes that made America's space program successful. He punctures the myths that have grown up around such legendary men as Chuck Yeager, John Glenn and Alan Shepard and portrays them honestly, warts and all. The test pilot sequences and the onerous astronaut training are the best parts, but the whole book is utterly fascinating. "The Right Stuff" may very well be the best aviation story ever written.

Tom Wolfe was once asked if the novel is dead. He replied that it's not quite dead, but it's on life support. He thinks the biggest problem with modern novels is that the novelists don't bother to do adequate research on their subject. How can one write a novel about India, for example, if one has never been to India? In Bonfire of the Vanities, Wolfe has done the research and has created an exact representation of modern city life in America, complete with politically self-serving DAs, civil rights demagogues, and pompous gold-coast dandies.
Wolfe is obviously a keen observer of detail. This skill combined with his mastery of the reportorial style of writing make for a great novel, and a great expose' of the hustlers and opportunists that use the system for their own self-interest. I think of him as a modern-day Sinclair Lewis, who once said that he never passed judgement one way or another, he just reported what he observed. Since most of us have probably never been in a high-rise apartment on Park Avenue or a housing project in the Bronx, it's interesting to read Wolfe's detailed descriptions down to the type of wallpaper and table centerpieces. All of this works to pull the reader into the scene, the only excess possibly being his proclivity for over-reporting clothing styles. Wolfe shows his love of clothing by using esoteric terms that probably have no meaning to the average reader.
Wolfe's scenes are so realistic the reader can imagine himself being in the action. I felt Sherman's fear in the Bronx jail cell. I felt his shame when lying to his wife about his relationship with Maria. The characters and dialog are so real, even though the reader may not live in that social milieu he can identify with the situation. The action moves at a rapid pace. Wolfe doesn't get bogged down with excessive narrative. He lets the characters speak for themselves--truly the mark of a great novelist.
I love the way Wolfe has the Brits comment on Americans. It's refreshing to see ourselves from another perspective. How funny it is to hear Peter Fallow complain about our "ridiculous country" and our lack of social graces, all the while sponging off of rich Americans at every opportunity.
This book is timeless. I read it for the second time recently and found it as enjoyable as the first. At the end I felt myself wishing for several more chapters. Bonfire of the Vanities should always stand as one of the best examples of American literature by one of our greatest writers.

Woolf is a genius -- this is one of the most enjoyable and interesting novels you may ever read. No where has the ego and greed of Wall Street in its heyday been so exposed along with all the conventions and pretenses of the newly rich and famous. Few readers will forget the opening page with "Shuuuurmen" blaring out. The characters are unforgettable and Woolf is an absolute genius at capturing detail in both his dialogue and description. One of my favorite all time novels. At once fun, and great literature.

The Bonfire of the Vanities, is an overwhelming insane story, but yet it has such a devout social commentary correctness to it, that to ignore it would be unjust.
Wolfe creates an amazing story line, which throughout the whole book is very consistent, but yet at the same time drifting. Every character in the book is given their own personality, problems, and mini-story line, in essence their own book. As the story moves along everyone is pulled together in the overriding story line but yet again they stay consistent to their own stories. You end up watching every individual character play their own role and you ge tot know them more than it seems necessary, although in the end you realize why you needed so much detail.
Not only does Wolfe provide lavishly entertaining characters, but also a strong commentary by the master himself. Every word printed in the book is a reflection on how Wolfe views the world, and the types of people we really are. Although never having visited New York myself, Wolfe creates more than realistic picture of how he and the rest of the world view New York. The rich vs. the poor or the black vs. the white. Everyone is placed in one group or the other whether they like it or even fit into it...
Wolfe's commentary and vivid use of racist terms at times becomes hard to bare and understand. Although with out it, it would be just a simple book, never a bestseller. It is exactly this type of language that makes the book more than an interesting read, but also an insightful and provocative journey through the mind of Tom Wolfe and the world he sees.

Wolfe really keeps you on the edge of your seat, and despite being accused of taking liberties with the literal truth still creates a book that will teach you a great deal about the history of the early days of the American space program. This is one of the only nonfiction books I've read that reads like a well written novel. I will be diving further into the Wolfe cannon because this book was so good.

I have been a Tom Wolfe fan for over two decades but continue to think that his real talent is for the essay and not for long fiction. Like Mailer, he seems to be able to string words together with unnerring skill but has trouble sustaining a tight narrative. Mostly, for me, what kept this book from coming alive was my dislike for the main characters. I just didn't care what happened to them. Rather, nothing could be bad enough. This is pure prejudice on my part, but I can't get past it. I hate these folks - their lifestyle, their values, their friends, their work, their entire social world - and I really don't want to read about them. Certainly not read this many pages. Couldn't he have punctured the hero's little life in half the number of pages and not left the reader so numb?

I picked this book up on the recommendation of strangers who said that it was one of those must read American novels. I'm always leery of these recommendations as they Ayn Rand usually appears on them and as a someone once told me "Friends don't let friends read Ayn Rand". This was a surprisingly good book, I can't say how accurately it portrays New York City in the late 80's early 90's but it feels real, and the tensions and issues it deals with (race/class inequalities, the purpose of wealth) are ones we've yet to overcome or even recognize they need to be dealt with... Highly recommended.

Although Tom Wolfe's way of writing may seem strange and at times weird, the story of these test pilots and pioneer astronauts is a classic. Beginning with the stories of pilots like Chuck Yeager, the man who broke the sound barrier, the book develops into the grand drama that was the space program and the race against the Soviets to the new frontier, chronicaling the pilots who took such great risk in participating in it. If you liked the movie, you'll love the book. A great work that I highly recommend to all readers.

For me, at the beginning there was an intrest in how all of these people related together. What could a Bronx defense attorney have to do with this guy that makes a ton of money on Wall Street?

Sherman McCoy had a demanding presence throughout the book. He is the elusive millionare that everyone wants to be. He seems to have everything...what could possibly go wrong?

Then there is his mistress. She is cheating on her husband, but seems otherwise harmless. It turns out she just may be the sneakiest of all.

I cannot believe how the justice system was run in this book. What Kramer did was crazy. I felt it really gave me an inside look at what really happens and how people try to win over their consituants. Poor Sherman just got lost in the shuffle. A great read!

Tom Wolfe has a magical touch for breathing life into non-fiction, as in The Right Stuff, but in Bonfire of the Vanities, his skill as a novelist and a satirist is blatantly evident. This bleak and witty portrayal of New York life in the eighties is both hilarious and dark at the same time. Wolfe's characters represent the spectrum of human behavior, while his situations are riddled with ironies and paradoxes of truth about human existence. This book is most enjoyable, I would imagine, if you have at least some knowlege of New York, because much of its humor and depth stems from New York culture, but it is also true that New york is a micrchosm of american existence on a whole, so Bonfire of the Vanities may, in fact, be a universally American Novel. Whichever, it is worth reading if not only for the reason that it is funny, brilliantly written, and makes clear the fact that Tom Wolf's name belongs on the list of satirists that includes Jonathon Swift and Oscar Wilde.

Chock full of sweeping history of the space program, leavened with generous anecdotal gossip. How clever is the Man in the White Suit, to take this story back to Edwards AFB and test pilots. I reread this book every few years, or whenever I want to get goosebumpy about America all over again. Dredging up Grissom's capsule is bound to revive interest in this book, and the movie for that matter, which both richly deserve. If all books were as gripping, we wouldn't have TV.

I'm not sure why this book got so many five star reviews. It's not a terrible book, but I found it to be incrediably predictable and dull. I had pretty much figured out everything that was going to happen within the first hundred pages or so. There wasn't much point in finishing it. I love long books, but this one was pointlessly so. Wolfe goes into a lot of useless rambling that has little if nothing to do with the plot. I found myself skimming many of the pages without feeling I has missed out on anything important. Definately the sort of book you read only if there is nothing else around.

As a young kid, I carefully followed the Mercury astronauts, and later the Gemini and Apollo astronauts. I enjoyed this book. Wolfe's admiration for the astronuats' ( as well as test pilot Chuck Yeager's ) courage is clear. But this is not a whitewash, and at least some of the astronauts gave way to the temptations of stardom. The movie is worth seeing too.

The most perfectly plotted and elegantly paced novel since the Fountainhead. This is an orchestra of a novel, with all the pitfalls, extremes and human tragedies we expect of our very best literature.

Tom Wolf did a great job with most of his facts. However I believe he made a dreadful mistake when he implied Gus Grissom panicked and blew the hatch on the Liberty Bell 7. The official investigation did not place any blame on Gus. Yet Tom Wolfe would make the reader believe Gus was some kind of fool. If that were the case, would NASA have then given him command of both the first Gemeni and Apollo flights?
Obviously Tom Wolfe must have felt the needed to smear the name and reputation of this National Hero -- many years after Gus, Ed White and Roger Chaffee had died in the launch pad fire of Apollo 1 on January 27, 1967. It was certainly too late for Gus to defend himself personally. Others can help by understanding that "The Right Stuff" is wrong about Gus Grissom.

'Bonfire of the Vanities' is a quintessential novel of the contemporary era not only for its literary craft, but also for its insight into the modern-day social system. Wolf accurately depicts this system on all fronts. The social interaction between economic classes, the growing problems (maybe even failure) of politics and justice as vehicles of freedom and democracy, and the powerful control of consumerism over us all are themes of the book underlying a story masterfully written from a number of the characters' perspectives. You start to feel the strengths and weaknesses of each character, realizing how human nature and illusions of grandeur make us all into people we never thought we'd become.
Being a big Easton Ellis fan, I thought the descriptive writing in this book was far from excessive and only illustrated some of its themes of materialism. It's also probably one of the fastest (substantive) 700 pages I've ever read. Don't count on the film for anything but a good laugh.
Regardless, you will be more enlightened after readiing this book.

I am a foreigner, and after reading this book halfway, I asked myself, "Gee, is this the way New Yorkers talk? Using the 'F' word most of the time? This is not what I've seen on TV and in the movies." Several scenes are also unconvincing. Top of the list is when Sherman McCoy tries to drag his dashshund into the rain but the mutt resists. Having owned a daschund before, I know it's not the kind of titanic struggle that Wolfe describes. The party scene where NY's socialites boorishly laugh "Hack hack hack Haw haw haw" is also incredulous. The author also injects too much details into both setting and characters. Even an ashtry is described vividly : ".. and with his right, he put the cigarette out in a Lalique ashtray with a lion's head sculpted on the rim." The plot (which revolves around a hit-and-run accident) is too weak to carry the weight of more than 100,000 words in its 680 pages. When I reached chapter 23, I skipped the remaining 8 chapters and jumped to the epilogue just to find out the fate of the protagonist. Wolfe's style of writing is not my taste.

This book by Tom Wolfe was interesting to a point. It gives a
good characterization of the many types of people that you will find in New York City. You have the Wall Street types,you have a black activist,you have society ladies. The book stays bogged bogged down in this routine tom the point of being nearly boring.
It becomes difficult to read after a point. I have read no more Tom Wolfe books after I read this one.Find this one in a used book store.

Not since The Great Gatsby has a work so completely defined an era with such brutal honesty. So revealing of the affectations of the period, the filming of this book for the big screen was banned in the Bronx, ironically giving proof to Wolfe's indictment of the liberal political machine of the 1980's. This is a classic "must read" and, as usual, the film doesn't come near to doing the book justice. If you haven't read Bonfire, you're not well read.

Vulgarity is not an acceptable adjective. The F word is used so many times that the book is an embarrassment. When one must interject such words it shows a lack of intelligence, a poor vocabulary, or both.

This book is so politically incorrect that it was insulting. As a well-educated, proud Southern Lady, I was offended to have the author feel the need to rewrite in italics a poor impersonation of a Southern accent. I felt sorry for the fine citizens of NYC that Mr. Wolfe was determined to stereotype in the most demeaning manner possible. It should never be acceptable to put others down to build oneself up. That demonstrates weakness of character.

The plot itself is absurd. A power broker hits a child in the Bronx. However, the "Master of the Universe," (the author's description, not mine) is too afraid of the woman with whom he's having an affair to go to the police.

The end of the book is a mess. Could Mr. Wolfe not reach a logical closure?

The author demonstrates his ignorance in many ways, not the least of which is art.

I usually stick to either non-fiction or historically accurate novels. This filth is a good reason to stay in my genre.

If he were my student, I wouldn't accept this work. College freshman are on the whole better writers.

I understand that Mr. Wolfe is well known. How much sadder that he abuses his platform as a writer. I want to respect him for his craft, but I just can't.

On a personal note, I don't derive pleasure in writing such a lowly review. I try to respect the author for the time and creativity it takes to write something to share with the world. However, the writer should take his responsibility seriously to attempt to write quality work.

Somehow I'd missed reading Bonfire of the Vanities back when it came out. Now I see why it's considered a modern classic. Wolfe's characters are richly drawn composites of how I picture the ultra rich Wall Street traders, contrasted with the whole other world of the South Bronx. Although I've never been there or done that, I can relate to these characters and the fascinating situation that unfolds when their world's collide. Sherman, his wife and mistress, assistant D.A. Kramer and all the rest are so consumed with lust for power and position that their fall from grace seems appropriate; after all, what does really matter in life? The preoccupation with wealth, status and the pretenses of success all come tumbling down. I look forward now to reading more Tom Wolfe; I see what all the fuss is about.

The Bonfire of the Vanities clearly made several strong points about racism, sexism and capitalism in America, but I personally enjoyed the attention Wolfe paid to developing the characters and situations each character was in. All the plot lines are just built up by the indepth description of how each character was involved. The reader is never left wondering why the characters are doing what they are doing, but everything is very obviously connected by Wolfe's previous narrative that it gives the reader something to look to for clarification. Specific events such as the mayors obsession with mayonnaise "who in the name of God would bring a half eaten jar of mayonnaise to a public meeting?" or Sherman's confusion in the Bronx "Who on Earth would take the trouble to shove a chair in a chicken wire fence in this neighborhood?" also shows the actual character's detail orientedness, and perhaps shows that focus on detail is an inherent human flaw.

I read it when it first came out and was bogged down in the multi-voiced plot; so much that I skipped most of middle and read the post script. I enjoyed my recent reading so much more, now that bonds and stocks and narcissistic rich folk have become less of a rarity and more commonplace. As before, it is quotable and readable and at times, hilariously funny. I'd vote for it as book of the decade except for the weak ending. Even at that, I'd put it high on the list of Best Books, simply because of its prescience about the coming financial crash.

Reading "Bonfire of the Vanities" is the best thing happened to me this year. The novel is one of the best I've read in my life. The author has expertly developed a chain of ordinary events into a gripping tale. Very strong character development, elaborate details and unbiased analysis of the contradictions existing in metropolitan life in USA are the hallmarks of this work. Shame that Tom Wolfe has written only two novels.

Although several reviewers have claimed that elements of this novel have dated the essence of this novel will always be relevant. True this was written pre-internet, pre-Clinton, pre 9/11 but the vanities that drive the chattering classes, so perfectly satirised by the author, are an inherent characteristic of moneyed urban dwellors anywhere on this planet. The spiralling nature of the plot complements the authors heady character descriptions and set-pieces.

I know several people who have read and hated this novel because of its ultimately bleak portrayal of humanity. I however found it marvellously uplifting (not to mention hilarious) and view the book more as a dark fable on the perils of ambition in a capitalist society. The reader should note that most of the novel's characters would be regarded as successful in their respective professional lives and that each of those characters have lost a little bit of their soul to get where they are. What Wolfe allows us to ponder is : Is this what it takes to get to the top?

Tom Wolfe provides compelling and fun observations about the full-throttle 80s NY lifestye. I LOVED this book and could not put it down. Any student of life's lessons or business non-fiction will love this book too. Its right up there with "Liar's Poker" and "Barbarians at the Gate" (also excellent books) in terms of Americana and Wall Street. Enjoy!

An amazing romp through 1980s New York, Wall Street, the court system, and the lives of the rich and aspiring to be rich. Through the downfall of wall street trader Sherman McCoy, Wolfe brings the reader into the psyches of his characters, forcing one to sympathize with even the most despicable. In the process, he helps us to understand humanity. Highly recommended.

Best description of this book is that of bridge between the genre novels and literature. It is not very good literature nor is it as bad (some might say less interesting) as genre novels. The characters and character descriptions are overstated and could very well have been written by anyone after reading 10-15 crime thrillers. The redeeming feature of this book is the work Tom Wolfe put into collecting a lot of information about a particular period in a particular city, varying from inner-city housing projects, jail cells, attorney's offices and high society life.

The story is that of a fundamentally decent white male getting caught up in a minor traffic accident and getting exploited by the society around him. A criticism I have is that the characters who donot belong to the traditionally wealthy (means non WASP men according to the author) are portrayed as upstarts resentful of old wealth and wanting to bring them down to their level. For some reason there is not a single character in this book who want to rise up and be equal to the traditionally wealthy by honorable means.

Wolfe is an amazing author. On a literary level this is one of the best books I've read. The dialogues in the book are marvelous while the writing itself creates some beautifully contrasting and yet similar characters. The book bleeds social and racial overtones that are devastatingly real and yet rarely put onto paper the way Wolfe has. The story is okay, but the lack of a hero left me detached from the whole thing. The book is worth reading however, if only to appreciate the bluntness and humanity in Wolfe's writting.

I used to live in New York City, so I thought Tom Wolfe was right on target in describing its politics and different social scenes, and satirizing them. However, I couldn't relate to any of the characters; they were far too stereotypical and not enough like real people for my taste. You had your token Irish cops and pols, your token Italian pol/mafiosos, your token Upper West Side Jewish intellectual lawyers, and your token doofus WASP stockbrokers and socialites. I wouldn't be surprised if some people found these depictions insulting. Maybe I'm personalizing this, but it's also almost as if Wolfe is saying that if you don't fit any of these stereotypes, you can never be a true "hip" New Yorker. I would have found this book more interesting had the characters been much more complex.