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SOMETHING HAPPENED
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
17 posts | 12 read | 10 to read
Bob Slocum was living the American dream. He had a beautiful wife, three lovely children, a nice house...and all the mistresses he desired. He had it all -- all, that is, but happiness. Slocum was discontent. Inevitably, inexorably, his discontent deteriorated into desolation until...something happened.Something Happenedis Joseph Heller's wonderfully inventive and controversial second novel satirizing business life and American culture. The story is told as if the reader was overhearing the patter of Bob Slocum's brain -- recording what is going on at the office, as well as his fantasies and memories that complete the story of his life. The result is a novel as original and memorable as hisCatch-22.
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review
QBub
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
Panpan

I loved Catch-22. Something Happened is everything Catch-22 isn‘t. It is the account of a humorless husband and father who is dissatisfied with his life but won‘t leave. According the Heller‘s daughter in Yossarian Slept Here, portions accurately reflect life in the Heller household after the publication of Catch-22.

review
Minervasbutler
Something Happened | Joseph Heller
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Pickpick

Bleak, unremittingly miserable interior monologue told by a self-loathing narrator who is unblushingly sexist, racist, and homophobic. It really shouldn't work and many people will hate it, but I found it riveting and totally unlike anything I've read before.

57 likes2 stack adds
blurb
Leftcoastzen
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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Before we get through May 1, wanted to mention today was Joseph Hellers Birthday.Always praised for his incredible Catch 22 , took him till 1974 to publish Something Happened .I love this book.I was too young supposedly for it to resonate with me , but it did .Look at the Wikipedia description & see if you are not intrigued.My parents were too young to be in WWII, big into the American Dream , I thought hmm 🎼this is not my beautiful house,👇

Leftcoastzen This is not my beautiful wife...letting the days go by....🎼Maybe I need to read it again..This is the way I remember it 5y
37 likes1 comment
blurb
Sha0102
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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1. São Paulo - Brazil
2. Karin Salughter
3. Giant
4. Bed
5. Tagged one
#littenintro

@tessavi

tessavi Thank you for joining in 🐕 5y
14 likes1 comment
blurb
Billypar
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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#getmovin #somethinglikethis
I've never read this, but the title cracks me up, so I think I'm going to have to at some point. Anyone read this? I've only ever read Catch-22 from Heller. @eanderson @Cinfhen

Leftcoastzen I absolutely love this book! 6y
Leftcoastzen I think it‘s an underrated masterpiece. 6y
Billypar @Leftcoastzen Ooh, very nice....I will have to check out then. And apparently, as I scroll down on the book's Litsy page, we had a conversation about it 9 months ago (though just the title, it seems). Is this what happens when you've been on Litsy long enough? 😂 6y
See All 10 Comments
Leftcoastzen Yep ! 6y
Leftcoastzen Honestly, I read it years ago but it seems to catch a zeitgeist.A sense of the family unit is not as cohesive as it might appear,”This is not my beautiful house,this is not my beautiful wife”.... 6y
Billypar @Leftcoastzen Sounds good to me- and that description actually fits my current read very well, which (being written in 2012) seems like it's consciously reimagining those sorts of novels. The main character even thinks a homeless man he befriends might be Don Delillo 😏 6y
Leftcoastzen I think Franzens Corrections owes a lot to Something Happened . I will check that one out. 6y
BarbaraBB I have had this book for years too and still not read it. So your discussion encourages me! @Leftcoastzen @Billypar 6y
Leftcoastzen @BarbaraBB I‘ve been meaning to re-read it,I‘ll sure be embarrassed if it doesn‘t live up to my hype.🤔🤣 6y
Cinfhen Nope! But @Leftcoastzen has me semi interested 😉 6y
25 likes10 comments
blurb
Sha0102
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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1. Japan but I live in São Paulo, SP, Brazil
2. Something happened by Joseph Heller
3. Outlander
4. Big fish, Gone with the wind
5. Breaking Bad, Peaky Blinders (it's always changing)
6. Coldplay
7. Red
8. SciFi, Historical fiction
9. Importing company
10. I had but she passed away a year ago. I still miss her every day.

#MeetTheLittens @maich

review
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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Mehso-so
quote
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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"No registered Republican would go quite that far. We'll let the Lord be our shepherd readily enough, but there's plenty we'll want, no matter how much we've already got. Otherwise we'll fire Him, retire Him, or ease Him aside."

quote
youneverarrived
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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Cathythoughts Isn‘t there something so special about our dreams ❤️ 6y
Andrew65 Unfortunately I don‘t remember most of my dreams. @Cathythoughts (edited) 6y
youneverarrived @Cathythoughts I have really vivid dreams most nights! 6y
48 likes1 stack add3 comments
quote
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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"... with liberty and justice for all who are speedy enough to seize them first and hog them away from the rest. ..."

DA-AMN!

quote
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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I am often aghast upon awakening from a sound, dreamless sleep to realize how far away from life I have been, and how defenseless I was while I was there. It is almost as though I truly am afraid of the dark ... And later. I might be unable to return. I don't like to lose touch with consciousness entirely. Dreams, even very bad, weird dreams, are my only contact with reality when I sleep; I want them;

SleepyDragon Full quote: "I am surprised when I wake up in the morning after a seizure of insomnia to realize I have been asleep; I am often aghast upon awakening from a sound, dreamless sleep to realize how far away from life I have been, and how defenseless I was while I was there. ... 6y
SleepyDragon ... It is almost as though I truly am afraid of the dark. Like my daughter. And my boy. Like I used to be as a child. And later. I might be unable to return. I don't like to lose touch with consciousness entirely. Dreams, even very bad, weird dreams, are my only contact with reality when I sleep; I want them; I even welcome headaches at night; I am out of existence. Where am I, then, when I am not? 6y
2 comments
quote
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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"I think that maybe in every company today there is always at least one person who is going crazy slowly."

#officespace #thatswhatshesaid #fallingdown

blurb
SleepyDragon
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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Trying to decide between a novel about politics in 1976 and a novel about an unhappy businessman in the 1960s. Decisions, decisions ...

#TBR #decisions #nextread #josephheller #gpodasgold #somethinghappened

blurb
Leftcoastzen
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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#anditsaugust #twowordtitles I could do this all day! A few from the shelves...

batsy Male Fantasies is required reading in these times 😖 7y
Leftcoastzen @batsy wow I thought nobody would have read those but me 7y
Billypar The short titles make me want to create a story out of them. 7y
See All 6 Comments
Billypar 'Something happened that day at Rock Springs when the dark princess unknowingly inspired male fantasies that led to fierce attachments, attachments which culminated in black death. Typical American story!' 7y
Leftcoastzen #Billypar🥇🤣🤣🤣🤓 7y
16 likes6 comments
blurb
Sha0102
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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1. São Paulo, Brazil
2. Something happenned.
3. Outlander by Diana Gabaldon +The Cousin Wars by Philippa Gregory.
4. Gone with the wind, The Schindler list etc
5. Breaking Bad, Dowtown Abbey, Spartacus, Sherlock etc
6. Marisa Monte, Cold Play, Maroon 5
7. Red
8.SciFi and Romance
9. Chemist
10. My 14 year dog, Persefone,passed away last January. I still miss her everyday. You'll see her in some old book pics here ❤
#meetthelittens @maich @Libby1

Libby1 Hi! So sorry to hear about your dog. 😢 7y
LauraBeth So sorry about your fur baby 😔 7y
maich Hy! I'm also Chemist. Chemical engeenir and I work in analytical research laboratory. 7y
See All 6 Comments
Sha0102 Hi @maich !! I work as quality control manager in a small company that deals with food additives!! 7y
Sha0102 @Libby1 @LauraBeth thanks, friends! 🐩 7y
maich @Sha0102 That's sound interesting.👍 7y
11 likes6 comments
blurb
patricknathan
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller

I finished this earlier today. I can't remember who told me to read this lesser-known Heller novel, or where I read about its existence, but I'm so grateful to have found it. It's one of the saddest, funniest, and most alienating books I've read. There's nothing I can really say to describe it, other than it's like looking at your own life if your life was behind the bars of a cage or splayed out on a laboratory table. In a good (scary) (sad) way.

Sha0102 This is one of my favorite books!!! 7y
3 likes1 comment
review
SaraBeagle
SOMETHING HAPPENED | Joseph Heller
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Pickpick

I love satire and Heller does it so well. As much as I enjoyed it though, it's not one I would necessarily recommend to anyone. When Vonnegut reviewed it, he called it "astonishingly pessimistic". I was impressed with the family relationships in this book- so insightful