Transcript:
[00:00:00] Tim: Welcome to Two Guys, One Book. This is Episode 2 where we are reviewing our first book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt, which is a nonfiction book. It's kind of a murder mystery, but it also has a lot of funny moments and interestingly character profiles.
It takes place in, Savannah, Georgia. And a lot of crazy things happen. So Brian is going to talk about why he chose this book and wanted to read it.
Brian: Yeah. Well first I didn't know it was nonfiction. I thought it was a fiction book. It was recommended to me by my brother. He recommended it to both me and my sister because my sister went to Savannah last year and he said, oh there's this great book about Savannah, makes you want to go there, and if you've been there it's even better. So yeah more than happy to knock this one off my to read list.
Tim: And it makes me want to travel to Savannah.
Brian: Yeah? Okay. That's my brother said but yeah, not so much really. Yeah. I'm okay. but yeah, so the book is about a journalist from New York who lives in New York and then he travels to Savannah for [00:01:00] vacation. He liked Savannah so much. He stays there more and more often on for several years and then one of the prominent characters he meets commits murder and he claims it's in self-defense, but he goes on trial for first-degree murder and that first couple get overturned by the Georgia state supreme court after he's found guilty spends a couple years in jail, and they get overturned again. And then eventually the fourth time around he gets found not guilty.
And the journalist is the narrator of the book he talks about all the people he meets in Savannah, he goes in the history of Savannah a little bit. And Jim Williams is the main character who kills his handyman / lover Danny Hansford in self-defense and is eventually exonerated and it's based on a true story.
Tim: So it's all centered around this murder but throughout the story, there's lots of interesting character profiles and fun situations and circumstances, so we'll talk more about that.
Brian: So what was your first impression Tim? That makes you want to go to Savannah?
Tim: The people in general I thought the characters were [00:02:00] really fun in that sense. I'm just talking about overall as a city. It sounded cool the way he described it.
The book itself? I was disappointed. Yeah. Because it sounds like this is going to be this dark suspenseful murder mystery book from the title from the cover everything leading up to before ´ reading this but I just didn't get that feeling actually reading the book.
I didn't feel much suspense. I didn't feel much excitement. It was just like oh there's a murder that happened and then. Here's Savannah and I like the Savannah parts! Savannah sounds cool. Lots of interesting characters. But I mean, what do you think?
Brian: Yeah. I mean, I agree. It was not a murder mystery air quotes around mystery, you know, it was just an interesting character story. Some things were entertaining and I enjoyed the book, you know, I felt like it took me a while to get into it. He had all these different stories about different characters at the beginning and [00:03:00] then the murder happened then for me that's when it got interesting is the murder happens in all these trials and everything going on, but I thought there would be more to all the character stuff in the first parts that would materialize the later half of the book and I just didn't feel like that really was the case.
Tim: So by background this guy is a magazine writer right? And it feels like he's good at these short profiles on people but as far as tying together a whole narrative, having structure I just don't think he really pulled it off.
Brian: Dang, alright - I mean he won a Pulitzer for nonfiction writing... So if there's not a murderer this never happens,
Tim: Yeah, it felt like he couldn't decide if he wanted this to be a murder mystery or a comedy because he had all these funny parts. I don't know. I mean authors mixed genres sure but it just felt like he was a little bit scattered.
Brian: Yeah, I mean, I liked it. I guess.
Tim: You liked it? I enjoyed it. I just didn't love it. All right.
Brian: Sure. Oh, I think that's an accurate statement.
Tim: I just feel like I was [00:04:00] misled in terms of what this would be like.
Brian: I did watch the trailer for the movie then and the movie looks terrible. I mean like a quintessential mid-90s, oh my god Kevin Spacey. Yeah, John Cusack's the narrator the author in this and they have Jude Law as Danny Hansford.
Tim: It looked like they followed the story though. Yeah, it did like how would you classify that as a movie? What genre would you put that in?
Brian: That's a tough question.
Tim: That's the thing, this had no clear feel to it.
Brian: You're right. I think it is too anti-climactic for a movie.
Tim: There's no suspense up to a murder just like "Oh, and then there was a murder and here are some other things that happened.
Brian: I thought it was interesting how during the third trial I think with the bags over Danny Hansford's hands to take them to the lab to get a gunshot residue test on, how the police are adamant they put the paper bags around the hands at the crime scene and then no the person at the ER put the plastic bags around the hands, which I thought that was interesting, you know how the gunshot residue could have rubbed off in the [00:05:00] ambulance ride over and then when she put the plastic bags on it created a state of static electricity that could even further remove it. I thought that was interesting, but is that climactic?
Tim: The whole last like fourth of the book is trial stuff.
Brian: Then like Voodoo Witch Doctor stuff. Yeah. We forgot to mention that. Minerva was the voodoo priestess that helps Jim Williams out casting spells. I guess it's the South and I guess that's part of Savannah I kind of dug one part of the voodoo thing. Was that at the very end when they go to Danny Hansford's grave like trying to make amends to the deceased. Yeah that I kind of dug, you know, like I get that but all this other stuff but the roots and then yeah and going to Dr. Buzzard, apparently Minerva's lover was Dr. Buzzard who died and I do have to say, Dr. Buzzard is a good name for a voodoo practitioner. I did like that. Alright Tim, so what we're some parts you actually liked?
Tim: I would say the characters were my favorite part specifically Joe Odom. I loved him as a character. He's like the [00:06:00] quintessential Southern gentleman and just the most charming character like you'd ever heard about I thought I mean what were your impressions of him?
Brian: I didn't really think he was entirely necessary.
Tim: Oh my God. He was like the biggest redeeming quality of this book.
Brian: I liked Jim Williams more than Joe. I was more about Jim Williams, not necessarily like him. I just felt like he was more intriguing because like his antiques, then we find out like he acted in self-defense. Yes, but like his story wasn't quite what he first led on for us to believe that eventually when Danny Hansford went to shoot Jim. The safety was on so nothing really shot at him so Jim another gun, shot Danny before you get the safety off. Yeah, and then he just fired Danny's gun, to cover it up.
So I thought that was compelling. I mean Joe Odom, he was just kind of like a vagrant who jumped from house to house and like he didn't pay anybody, wrote bad checks, just a piano guy and [00:07:00] just...
Tim: So you're coming at this from more of the crime perspective of the book you're interested in that angle.
Sure. I'm interested in these random people like Joe Odom because it was funny how we could kind of talk his way out of any situation. He was giving bad checks to everybody but like everybody still kind of loved him and he was sort of the life of the party he played the piano and people would come through his house like just hundreds of tourists and just sounded like a fun guy a fun character in the book.
And we can agree to disagree. Jim Williams - I don't think he brought much to the table as a lead. He was just sort of this rich guy. I don't know man ordering all these fancy antiques, but he was the one that committed the murder, you know, like that doesn't inherently make someone interesting though. When the whole book is pivoted on that.
Oh, but you're right. I am focusing on the crime aspect. Yeah. I'm not yeah as an individual right assume. He [00:08:00] didn't do a murder right into a murder. Yeah, like still think he's interesting. Yeah, but yeah, I don't know all yeah.
Tim: I liked Emma the singer. Okay, they called her the lady of six thousand songs.
I thought she was kind of a fun side character. just music in general seemed like a big part of Savannah life, partying and drinking they kind of like to enjoy themselves. They talked about Johnny Mercer a lot which did you know much about him going into this the singer.
No, I mean I knew he he was a singer and songwriter and he very popular in his day.
No, he did that song Moon River in Breakfast at Tiffany's. Yeah, or he wrote it and Audrey Hepburn second. But yeah, so Jim Williams lives in his house. I'm saying and Breakfast at Tiffany's right? I think so we can look it up later. It's irrelevant. Yeah. But anyway, Jim Williams lives in Johnny Mercer's old house.
Brian: It wasn't Johnny Mercer never [00:09:00] lived in that house, if you remember in the book they said. That was the thing that the tour guides got wrong was that Johnny Mercer never actually lived there, his great-uncle did or something like that Attica. Yeah. So his family had lived there but not Johnny.
Tim: Yeah, but everybody who lived there was like proud of Johnny Mercer and his you know kind of status there. Right? Right,
Brian: The other famous person from Savannah the Conrad Aiken the the poet. I don't know him. I only heard his name before but then the story they talk about him. He was the one where his dad killed his mother and then committed suicide and then they both buried and his parents are buried in Savannah that he moved away became a poet but then in later life he moved back and lived next door to his child at home where that happened. Yeah, and he got buried in the cemetery. I did like that one when the author's just first get into Savannah like I think Miss Harty, says I'm gonna take you to visit the dead and I I like cemeteries, so I can appreciate that aspect then she takes him to the cemetery where Conrad [00:10:00] Aiken is buried and Johnny is buried and all that stuff and eventually where Danny Hansford is buried.
Tim: Oh, yeah. That's the cover of this book, is there in the cemetery that statue.
So another character I really liked was the Lady Chablis.Okay, is this drag queen just a really big personality and it's funny to see her interact with the narrator who just on paper, he doesn't sound like the most interesting guy. He's just this guy from New York who needed some excitement in his life. So he goes down south but this drag queen just was really entertaining very like kind of standoffish and but fun, like kept things light sure.
Brian: Yeah. I do like her, her motto she got from her mother. Do you remember that?' Two tears in a bucket motherfuck it.' yeah. I love the one part where we first are introduced to the Lady Chablis and she talks about how she changed her name to Chablis, when she, you know, what was your name before that? She's like Frank.
I did like that [00:11:00] part too and you're right I feel like she really spiced it up like yeah, I mean like, you know, yeah, there was a lot of interesting characters which yes, I think she was definitely the most memorable.
Tim: But in no way was she really related to the crime?
Which made this feel like a disconnected book to me like I loved her as a character, right but it's probably two stories. Right?
Anyway, yeah, one interesting character was Lee Adler who's kind of like Jim Williams' rival in the town. It just struck me that there is a lot of like behind the scenes competition and sort of people vying for status and things like that in the community.
What do you think?
Brian: What did I think of Lee Adler, I I personally didn't see the point of him. Honestly. You didn't I mean, I guess as Jim Williams' rival sure and I guess by talking about Lee Adler he went into the history Savannah and a little more about that fine, but
Tim: [00:12:00] let me give my take. Okay, so. It's interesting how they talk about him trying to come off as like this holier-than-thou figure because they would bring him to Washington talk about how he's like restoring housing for like poor communities and things like that. But it seem like it's all sort of for show. He didn't seem like a really genuine guy, but he was also like Jewish and kind of scorned by the typical Savannah lifestyle.
So I feel like they were using him as a character to give some contrast. And he also paid the lawyer who was Prosecuting Jim Williams' case like supported him
as district attorney. Yeah, he paid money for his campaign to be District Attorney. He did. Hey, but he's I mean, it's pretty clear. He's like, yeah, he's very supportive of him.
Brian: I'm very much picking up that you were solely in this book for the characters pretty much. do you have any of those little ones so you're just you're just going over your favorite characters right now and when Kelly, uh, any other ones that stuck out to you at all?
Tim: Um, no, I thought those were the ones that had the [00:13:00] most of the story.
Brian: Oh, yeah, I see so you are you are viewing the characters, the random characters that we met along the way, you are viewing them as what they added to the story.
In terms of just making things interesting like this book is just showing how eccentric people in Savannah can be and I think the author did a good job of highlighting that so that's what I liked about it
All right, we can we can disagree. Yes, you know, we can blend some things because it's appearing that what you liked about the book is what I disliked about that book
You disliked the characters?
Brian: No I I'm not saying that I disliked the amount of characters, right?
I felt like it was a distraction. I felt like Emma Kelly, we followed her on a day when she goes around singing and playing piano and all these places. Yeah. It was like for like 10 pages. I was like, what was the point of that? Lady Chablis. I like just because her entertainment factor right, but she didn't like you said, she didn't add anything to the actual story and Leah, I guess.
Is there to provide like you said the context of like giving Savannah [00:14:00] some depth that yes, he might be doing this for selfish reasons, fixing up old homes, but he's also Jewish and maybe not accepted by the people of Savannah. so I kinda get that, but like Luther Driggers?
Yeah fluorescent fish and follow around him and Serena Dawes, like what's the point of that?
Tim: He's entertaining how quirky he was like he had flies that he kept on a string. Yeah, okay, I'm quirky too! Oh, I'm quirky.
Let me pose a theory here. Okay, I think that I wish the book had just chose to be solely about the characters and not even dealt with the crime stuff and you wish, from your perspective you're saying all these characters were a distraction from this crime element and I can understand that but I just think we'd rather see the book have taken separate directions.
Brian: And I think that's what makes the book then is like what is it trying to be? Yeah, and I think I think for some people who are just along for the ride, they might [00:15:00] like it more than us, but I think you're right.
I think we took two different routes you the character around me the crime route. And I guess we didn't appreciate the other side.
Tim: I think it's the author's responsibility. I think he should have been a little more deliberate in his route. It was 400 pages, 400 pages and he couldn't it was too much.
Brian: But like you said he's a newspaper reporter guy like I kind of feel like. That is how this is written. Like you said in shorter and shorter bits about characters and and yeah a bunch of articles strung up together.
I just didn't see the point of a lot of these characters.
But what I I did enjoy was the very small characters we got to meet like, the two I'm thinking of is Mr. Glover who still walking the dog? Like that was a short little thing that makes Savannah's seem quirky.
So his dog had died but he was he was he walked the dog for some rich guy.
Yeah, the rich guy died and left in his will that [00:16:00] Mr. Glover should get paid every week for walking his dog until and then the dog died. Yeah and the guy and Mr. Glover goes to the judge and says well judge the dog died. I guess you don't have to pay me each week to go walk the dog and the judge was like well, what are you talkin about Mr. Glover? I see the dog behind you right now. And as long as he's there you keep walking the dog will keep paying you. Yeah, everyone around town. He doesn't have anything. he's not walking a dog but everyone in town and asked him if he's walking the dog. He's like, yes, sir. Come on Patrick.
Which first how do you feel about human names for animals?
Tim: You're getting sidetracked...
Brian: I know but like that's what I found. Interesting is the dog's name was Patrick. I think that's fine. You think it's fine? Yeah, what do you name your pet? I don't have any pets. Have you had pets that's I had a cat growing up an orange cat named Marmalade. Okay, that was it. So any pet named human name, you're just totally against, that's what really gets just a little odd. That's all.
But so I'd [00:17:00] like mr. Glover and then the other one I liked was a little short thing. Where the author goes to another store where there's an owner that sits in like the corner and never moves and then there's a salesman that walks around the store helping customers and taking inventory and everything and the salesman has one eye he has a "carefully applied arc of purple eyeshadow that blazed like a lurid sunset on his left eyelid." And so he had this mascara on his left eye and his eye any and because he is a crossdresser but he knows that the owner never moves from the corner of the office. So he only does half his face and walks like a crab around the office.
So that the owner only sees half his face and the owner knows that he does it but the owner doesn't care, he's a good worker. I thought that was a cool thing you know? Little asides. Yeah. Yeah, so I mean but like that's just if you're gonna have [00:18:00] characters that are going to show examples of the quirkiness of a town like Savannah, that's all you need.
You don't have to follow Emma Kelly for 6000 songs, or Luther Driggers trying to have fluorescent fish in a tank it didn't move the story a long now and just for how long they dwelled on it, right? Correct? I'm sorry. We got sidetracked. but there was a still a lot of things I liked.
Yeah, I mean, I guess I'm big on the opening of a book and I just liked how he described Jim Williams and on the very first page "he was tall about 50 with darkly handsome almost Sinister features. A neatly trimmed mustache hairs turning silver at the temples and I so black they were like the tinted windows of a limousine. He could see out but you couldn't see in." so I kind of dug that and a few other things I like when he would talk about when Jim was in jail, and one of the cellmates was acting like a dog.
Haha that was so funny, I wrote that down. Yeah, that was hilarious. Do you want to [00:19:00] describe the will like so Jim is in jail after being convicted for murder the second time I think and and waiting an appeal.
and he spends like two years in the county jail and he's kept in the cell with uh how do they put it the homosexuals in the mentally? Unstable. Yep, and so he has a telephone he calls and does business on the telephone but one of the cellmates came in who acts like a dog barking and on all fours and lifted his leg and peeing on things and one time he was on a phone trying to sell or buy antiques.
And then this guy the the cellmate was barking like a dog. He's like, oh, that's just my Russian wolfhound. Then the cellmate changed octaves and started barking higher. And then June was that's my other dog the Yorkie and he's like Won't someone please put the dogs out in the garden! And the other cell mates all tackle the guy barking the dog and I could just have that picture of like almost like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest where they're all just getting it up on some mentally unstable [00:20:00] person and having them shut up.
but no Tim I could tell that this guy was an intellectual from New York, you know, one of those coastal elites, so I have a quiz for you to him. Okay. Can you tell me what these words mean the definition of some of these words because there were some words in here that I honestly had to look up, you know, that's a bonus to reading is that you expand your vocabulary and you want to become more well-read, right? Yeah, so I have words here that I had to look up and I want to see if you know what they mean obsequious oh stubborn stubborn unyielding. Wow. Nice Tim imperious that's when I had to Google to you. I forget domineering and the haughty manner dictatorial overbearing and uh appropriate opprobrious. I don't know opprobrious is to convey or Express opprobrium.
An opprobrium is the disgrace or [00:21:00] reproach incurred by conduct considered outrageously shameful because he was talking about I did like this thing at the end with Jim Williams is back home after being down not guilty. He's back home and he's sorting through the cards of in and out for his big Christmas party.
and I like that because it gave the author a way within the story to kind of review what happened to these characters, I mean, like you said this was several years of Savannah life. And so Jim Williams was going to put on this party for the first time in years, and he would have the people he would include within the party on his in pile and the people you would exclude on out pile and he would go through these cards.
Luther Driggers here Serena Dawes and then he came to Joe Odom and he thought about Joe Odom and his financial troubles and woes and he split up with his woman Mandy I think and then he put Joe in the in pile because he knew that Joe Odom would put on a good face despite the opprobrious, glances from the other, [00:22:00] partygoers.
Yeah. So I did I like that little bit how he could kind of recap the story what happened with the characters through Jim's Christmas party.
Tim: Yeah. The Christmas party was a good way to catch everybody up on what people are doing but maybe he didn't need to use these big words all the time New York words.
but the Christmas party was funny. There's one scene where it just kind of goes from conversation to conversation from different people one of the parties one year, and it's just really funny because everybody has some. Interesting backstory. it's funny everybody's rich but kind of crazy and everybody has a gun just with them but they're all drinking a ton of alcohol.
Another thing I liked was you know, what the very end Minerva and the narrator, are going to the graves at Bonaventure Cemetery and they're going to try to assuage Danny Hansford's spirit. let Jim be but then they there's a little thing he says "we passed the graves of bonaventure's two most famous residents Johnny Mercer and Conrad [00:23:00] Aiken Mercer's Epitaph affirming the Hereafter in which Angels Sing Aikens raising the Specter of doubt and a of destinations unknown."
I thought that was cool. The two most famous people from Savannah buried their their gravestones reflect two different views on the afterlife and I think that was good and evil Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Yeah heaven in hell dichotomy of Life. Yeah. Yeah. anything else you liked about.
Well, just to talk more about that voodoo. I thought it was funny like how specific it would get because the witch woman Minerva. She'd just be like, did you have a a quart jar with a label on it and nine shiny dimes and like dove's blood or something just like really specific stuff. I just thought it got pretty funny.
Oh you like that it was it was entertaining. I was like, this is ridiculous. And I think the author is describing it and kind of a tongue-in-cheek way. also a character I thought last one I'll talk about it is Sonny Seiler the lawyer the [00:24:00] second lawyer he hires, you know, because he's like this really intense kind of football guy and he owns the Georgia Bulldog like the mascot.
It was was his dog, which was so funny. Yeah. Yeah, and so they were like a four Ugas that he had like over the years. But he just like was obsessed with his Bulldog. I think Uga 6 by now, probably but I don't know. I mean I mean, yes didn't add to the plot but it's funny. Sure.
Brian: I guess I'm comparing it slightly to another book. That I really really like is Catch-22, and Catch-22 has a lot of interesting characters, but they all contribute to I I feel the overall Arc of the story. They're all intertwined within the storyline. I felt like a lot of these characters were introduced in the first half of the book.
We never hear from again, or if we do they're not in anyway relevant to the story.
Tim: It was just a choppy, kind of storyline. Yeah, not a lot [00:25:00] of flow to it. But anyway, so what do you want to move on to next?
Brian: Well, what do we want to elaborate on when we disliked?
I mean, it was mainly for me the characters and like I said in the first half it's fine like if they want to establish zany characters, that's fine. took me a second to get into it because of all the characters.
I was wondering where this is going and once the crime happened I was. An interested to see what would happen. but then after Jim was in jail for those two years when we talked about him being his cell and trying to conduct his business from the jail cell he says Savannah forgot about Jim and then he was going on these tangents about the Savannah College of Art and Design or that one woman who daughter was she wanted her to be ballerina, but she turned that vehicle officer.
I was like that's another like five to ten pages where I didn't really see what the point of that was. I mean, it could have been him. Just trying to pad the book to make it a little thicker for I'm sure his editor didn't want, you know, just 250 pages on it.
He probably wanted to something longer
Tim: but he wrote this over the course of [00:26:00] like eight years or something and he's only written like one other book. So I just don't think he's like a writer this is it I well that's harsh, a novelist. Yeah.
Brian: Because I mean I I know I mean that's one thing I'm hesitant about this is I don't want to critique people too. Harshly. Yeah, because this guy's a better writer than I am a lot of people like this book. Yeah. It's a best-seller. Yep, one Pulitzer whatever, you know, but yeah,
Tim: so can we talk more about Savannah? And because I think drew people to this largely. Yes, so some interesting things about it.
it's laid out in this kind of square pattern like these different squares. and then you have these Spanish moss trees or this cool kind of vegetation.
so it's just got a unique feel to it. I guess the southern feeling and then so they said Savannah was a coastal town? So they're used to like hosting people and so they're friendly and social but they're also sort of in their own world.
Like they don't want to be part of a bigger thing than themselves and I think that's what makes the [00:27:00] place interesting right?
Brian: I did like the very end talking about Savannah, he says, The ordinary become extraordinary eccentrics thrived every nuance and Quirk of Personality achieve greater Brilliance in that Lush enclosure than would have been possible anywhere else in the world.
I think that and that very much comes across in this book with these characters. Yes, they are very much, engrossed in the world of Savannah don't care about anybody really outside of Savannah. He goes at lengths to say that Lady Chablis is really the only one that even travels outside of Savannah and goes through the other towns nearby.
it seems like an interesting place.
Tim: Let me read just the last line because I think it kind of goes off of what you're saying. the author says for me Savannah's resistance to change was it Saving Grace the city looked inward sealed off from the noises and distractions of the World At Large it grew inward to and in such a way that its people flourished like hot houseplants tended by an indulgent Gardener.
I think [00:28:00] that's a good line. Yeah. I did enjoy that that is well, but and it was just funny how much everybody just like partied there and gossiped
I looked at an interview with the author on YouTube and he talked about gossip too and how big of a role that was in the town because he said that they gossip more than anywhere else he's been to. And that kind of encourages strange behavior because it's like the stranger you are the more people are going to talk about you. So they sort of appreciate their eccentrics. Whereas if you're just a weird person in like, I don't know around here then you're sort of shunned but there they kind of encourage it. You know what I mean?
Sure sure I mean, I like that enough about the characters but Savannah likes their isolation. they're friendly to tourist it sounds like but they don't want to just be like every other place.
Brian: They're friendly to tourists.Yeah not transplants them move their is that I mean impression. Yeah, because yes, they're welcoming to [00:29:00] tourists because they know tourists will come and go but anybody who come my impression was that if anybody comes from the outside, it takes them a while to get part of the social structure that is Savannah. Yeah, it's a small place and they want to preserve their kind of dynamics. I think. Yep.
so do you have anything else you want to do? Did you like Lady Chablis at the debutante ball? Yeah. That was also didn't move the story along. No, but but I entertain I enjoyed that as well. Yes, so just to give a brief description. She goes to this like black debutante ball, which will the narrator does he's invited.
Yeah the narrator and he tells lady Chablis he's going and she wants to go along but he's kind of like no, I'm just go to this by myself because these are. These are uh dignified individuals. Yeah, and she crashes crashes it hard. Yeah, it's funny like she keeps it low key at first but then she gradually just kind of you know does a big fuck you to the whole thing [00:30:00] and it's funny.
Tim: Yeah to her. It was Rebellion. I think against these black, neighbors of hers who were seemed like maybe they were trying to assimilate to the mainstream culture. Whereas she's someone who still like proud and independent, I think she was sort of resentful of them sure was my feeling.
Brian: Did you notice? Lady Chablis plays herself in the movie. That's her. Yeah photo. Yeah. Wow, I guess she asked to I think in the I mean, I don't think like who do you cast? Yeah. You know a black drag queen. Yeah. it's funny that Clint needs to a directed this I wouldn't have pegged as the Director.
Well that was still early in his directing career. Did he direct Unforgiven? I think that was like his first it's hit or miss with his movies. Let's be real. Yeah. did you see how they did Minerva in the in the movie and the trailer it looked very much weird
I feel like they made her just be like a cooky, zany person when I feel like they could have done something darker. Yeah. I mean, that's just my...
Tim: They could have given her more depth. It [00:31:00] looked like they made her sort of this really silly character. which a lot of the voodoo was silly my my sense and you kind of touch on this I think is that a lot of the voodoo was sort of rooted in like a therapeutic element where she would say something about how Jim Williams had to forgive Danny or be on good terms with him.
And even though there's all the metaphysical stuff is probably kind of nonsense, but just this sense of Making amends or forgiving these people. I thought that was interesting.
Brian: Yes. I agree. That's the part I liked that was my big takeaway and especially at the end when she's going to the cemetery to give Danny Hansford some Wild Turkey or whatever pores and on his grave.
Yeah, and you know, yes, that's the part I did with the voodoo. But yeah, the saw the other all the other stuff was like. Like how much the bad she put on like the judge and the da and that stuff that real like okay. Yeah all the curses. Yeah, we're a little much I [00:32:00] mean, it just goes to your part of the story that you like with the characters.
Tim: Yeah, so starting to wrap up, this was our first book review so I know it's going to be kind of choppy. We're still learning our our craft and I think that's okay.
Brian: Yeah, and so, yes, we want to include more input from our community of listeners.
Hopefully in the future. Yeah. All zero of them right now. What's that? Yeah. So yes, if you wanna tell us what you think of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. You can still comment on our website by all means. we will definitely read those. and yes, we want to incorporate more viewer or listener input in the future.
So the next episode will do is Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson? Yeah looking forward to that. Yeah. So, we want to give a final rating on Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil? Let's wrap it up. Yeah, you sure. Okay. All right. So we're going to include zero or is it just one to five one to five?
I think ones low we probably won't review zero [00:33:00] but now right. Yeah. So 1 to 5. You want me to go first? Yeah, three. Really? Yeah. What are you gonna say? You're not gonna say five know three or four. I was thinking three too, huh? I'm surprised, why did you act surprised then? I thought you're gonna dog the book some more.
So yeah, I was gonna go three. Yeah because. Yeah think that attempt three out of five. Yeah 5. Yeah, I think that's appropriate. It's a three book. Yeah, it is. It's fine. It's not bad. No, it's just didn't blow us away. Right? I think it is entertaining if you want to just good casual read.
Yeah. I think this is your book, I don't think it's gonna grab you with suspense. But like you said there's a lot of characters that keep you entertained. And yeah.
Tim: If you read this you'll learn about an interesting city. You'll read about some eccentric people.
And there's a murder that's fine and nefarious [00:34:00] goings-on but yeah, so. I'm glad we're getting this thing started.
I'm glad to get this book check off my to read list, even if it's a 3 out of 5, that's still a worthy book to read. so I'm looking forward to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and your explanation of why you're making us read it. All right, we can say over the next episode.
Yeah. So I'm looking forward to that and please leave your feedback on our website and let us know how we can improve in the future. Absolutely.