Tender is the Night

Title: Tender is the Night

Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald

Summary: Dick Diver is the husband of Nicole Diver who suffers mentally from a childhood abuse. Dick struggles with their relationship after meeting a young movie star. In the end, it seems Dick's love for Nicole is more of a doctor-ly caring. When Nicole finally wins her emotional battle, there is nothing left to keep them together.

Recommendation: No. One thing I don't like about F. Scott Fitzgerald is that his writing leaves too much to be assumed. I frequently cannot tell whether something is actually happening or if the characters are just thinking about it. I found several quotes that spoke to me, being very true to life. The back of the book says "Fitzgerald was having a difficult time writing (this book)" because of his wife's nervous breakdown and his own drinking problems. Both of which are themes in this book. I was also struck by the amount of immorality, alcohol, etc. that takes places in this book set in the 1920s. I like to think that there wasn't so much of those things in the 1920s, but I've concluded that there has always been social problems, we just have more technology that makes it easy to hear about them. They are talked about more openly today rather than being just mentioned or hinted at.

Hearts: 2