Burning Down George Orwell's House   Andrew Ervin
Disappointing novel about a man who gives up his life in Chicago for 6 months in the house in which George Orwell wrote 1984 on the island of Jura in Scotland to try to find himself. The prose is adequate, but the protagonist seems adolescent, and the other characters are sitcom-level eccentrics. Found Pitcairn senior to be completely unbelievable, the plot became slapstick, and the concerns shallow. Too bad.