Roshalde and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

"Rosshalde" by accalimed novelist, Herman Hesse, is very much an autobiraphical account on the author's personal life. Although much of his work does span the genres, many of Hesse's works do in fact, have autobigraphical qualities. Hesse's works are among the most read, with his most popular novel Siddhartha being a common literaty work used in the classrooms of both high schools and colleges. Hesse does dive into other topics, such as Science-Fiction and Fantasy, but ver few do lead to the case of whether these works are also autobiographical in nature.
Rosshalde, the home of Johanan Verguth, and his family, the famous house bought by a renouned painter, who seems to have everything in the world, but only one joy, his son, Pierre. Verguth may have his friend Otis, a world-traveler who resides in India, and a close friend of the dear painter. Some areas may even hint at a kinship relationship between the two, who act more like brothers than childhood friends.

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Hesse's character Verguth, being more a meat puppet than a character playing a vital role, is more-or-less a jagged-edged character, who has fallen out of love with his vife, and seems to only care about his son Piere. Even his older son Albert, who we the readers meet for the last three-quaters of the book, comes home for holiday, despite his animosity towards Johan. With-that-in-mind it seems to lead us into what exactly is going on in Verguth's life. Verguth is quite unhappy with his life indeed. He lives inside hi art studio, and his only true love is his son Piere. Unfortunately, a terrible tragedy occurs, and Hesse's close-to autobiographical novel (Aside also from Steppenwolf) leads Verguth to travel with his friend Johan into the world of giving up all material and living in the enightenment of one's own soul. This novel is short, but bittersweet, and something to consider for a rainy, gloomy day, where nothing can disturb you. I do not highly recommend it over Hesse's other works, but this is nevertheless, a Herman Hesse novel. Roshalde is literally a short story in novel form, and it has depths and settings that shine in novellas like before, but it's honestly not all that deep in the part of story, and it's good to me, just not something common for general reader. Might I recommend his Science Fiction "The Glass Bead Game"? If so, I do think that story, being almost double the size of Roshalde is a worthy reader to the testament of Hesse's diversity in genre.

The Curious Incident With the Dog in the Night-Time is perhaps one of the best first novels I've ever read. Of course, not adding in Hossieni's The Kite Runner (A Major Motion Picture in November of this month) it is hilarious in the cruel sense, and I could see this being an instant classic for the adult growing up reading the Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys mysteries, but with the satrical twist of making the detective an adolescent boy with a form of Autism that is searching for the murderer of a dog.
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That's right, it's a murder mystery....about a dead dog. Let me correct myself, but not give too much away for those who have yet to read this: murdered dog. See, i found the who plotline outrageous, the entire setting was maddening, as we went about in the main character's life, it was almost impossible to believe that this story went from the murder of a dog to a conspiracy surrounding the main character's parents, even involving one particular family member as a suspect to the neighbor's murdered pooch. This is a smart, witty, almost downright slapstick murder mystery guranteed to even make Angela Lansbury blush a bit with envy. If you have yet to read this, do yourself a favor, pick it up and read it! Do some justice to your piece of mind and read a novel that acutally makes math comprehendible! Also acknowledge that the chapters go by prime numbers, so yes, you are on chapter 223, just it's not really in sequential order. Again, this is almost as fun as picking up a MAD comic that doesn't suck, well maybe it is even better, I give it my offical \m/ devil horns of approval for fun!
Not to blab at how great this book is, but I also reccomend that you read this book on a sunny day, maybe witht he shades cracked even, and just relax on your recliner, your bed, or even a front stoop.