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Book Group May 2015 - Catch-22 Discussion thread

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westmoors May 2015 12:52pm, 25 May 2015 600 posts	Quote Pin westmoors So glad I finally got round to reading this. I really enjoyed it. Loved the characters. Best bit was when Yossarian realised that Orr's "crashes" were just practices for his escape and his regret for not joining him.
Lorraine May 2015 6:33pm, 25 May 2015 1,186 posts	Quote Pin Lorraine Just finished it. Took me almost the whole book to get into it and I gave to agree with above. It did make me laugh out loud an awful lot.
Ambling Andrew May 2015 9:39pm, 25 May 2015 343 posts	Quote Pin Ambling Andrew One of the really great books of the 20 century.
Columba May 2015 10:02pm, 26 May 2015 6,605 posts	Quote Pin Columba It's a long time since I read it but I seem to remember it takes you from laughing out loud to horrific tragedy to screaming with rage at the waste of life, within minutes or even seconds.
Laura L Jun 2015 1:06pm, 10 Jun 2015 39 posts	Quote Pin Laura L I read about two/thirds of Catch 22 several years ago. I keep meaning to go back and finish it but haven't got round to it. I really enjoyed this book but I just found it quite easy to put down because - if memory serves me - it was quite meandering in it's style, which i'm sure was intentional on Heller's part. More recently in work I felt I was in Catch 22 when the managers explained some of the new and ridiculous processes they wanted to adopt to prove that we are a necessary service and worthy of our funding. But that's for another thread...
DazTheSlug Jul 2015 3:34pm, 1 Jul 2015 1,129 posts	Quote Pin DazTheSlug enjoyed it... mostly the episodic nature with short chapters made it easy to pick up, but also easy to put down as there was no story running through it. the characterisation and dialogue were good and the humour/surrealism created a unique atmosphere the writing style must've been shockingly ground-breaking in 1961 and still seems remarkably "modern" even today some of the individual chapters are superb ("Luciana", "Mrs Daneeka" and the last two spring to mind) even the lack of a story would've been forgivable if it'd been a bit shorter as it'd've come over as an "impressionistic" work, just dipping the reader into the madness however, at 570 pages I thought it needed either a story or a "point" and neither was apparent to me 8/10