A Simple Plan

I felt a lot of tension reading this book, and it really kept my attention. Even though I can't relate to a lot of the decisions made by the characters, I can understand how they felt after having made them.

Many people were disappointed by Smith's most recent novel, "The Ruins" (although I wasn't one of them) so I knew I had to read Smith's first novel to see how it compared. The truth is there is no comparison that can be made as "A Simple Plan" is as far removed from "The Ruins" - genre-wise, story-wise, everything-wise- as a novel can be. If there could be a true comprison made for this book, it would be Woody Allen's film, "Crimes and Misdemeanors." That an author can write two such different novels AND succeed with both is an achievement.Smith is a damn good writer and this tale, a story as simple as Hank Mitchell's plan, is riveting. There wasn't one point in this novel where I wasn't worried that if I turned the page, everything would come out in the open. Between Hank's simple plan, his wife Sarah's murderous lucidity and the growing body count, there is never a dull moment. I do confess that by the end of the book, I was starting to feel like the widening circle of death was getting a bit too extreme (for those who only know the film version of the novel, they diverge in a major way halfway through so the book will be a new experience) but at the same time, if I was Hank Mitchell, what would I have done? That's a question I kept asking myself and still do.

Reading Scott Smith's "A Simple Plan" is like being on a train with no brakes. What starts out as a simple plan made by Hank, his brother Jacob and Jacob's best friend, Lou, turns into a complicated plot that leads to disaster as the conspiracy involves more and more people and more crime than their small town in Ohio has ever seen. The characters' behavior is shockingly unbelievable at times because these "nice, ordinary guys" had never been in trouble. That was before they stumbled upon the wreckage of a small single-engine plane and a duffel bag behind the dead pilot that contained $4.4 million.The actions of the three men are so surprising because they're "normal guys." Hank is an accountant at a feed store, married with a new little daughter, and although his brother is fairly poor and not ambitious, he had never been in trouble. Lou drank a little too much, but he had a home and a girlfriend, but Hank had trouble trusting his brother and Lou. The three stood around the plane trying to decide what to do, whether to turn in the money and report the plane, put the money back in the plane and say nothing, or keep the money. It was just a simple plan that Hank came up with. But things didn't go simply and as one disastrous act leads to another it becomes a complex story with actions by these three men that are hardly believable in the context of the story."A Simple Plan" is about what happens to people when greed, selfishness and jealousy take over and how people rationalize their greed with words and thoughts that disguise it and make it into something that seems acceptable to them. They even rationalize terrible acts of violence as being necessary for the good of someone else when that altruistic thought is still a crime. These characters seem very real and the reader learns a lot about them over the course of the 416 pages that just fly by. Scott Smith put the story together so that there isn't a single loose end left untied and the story flows at such a good pace that reading it is like watching it all play out in front of your eyes without skipping a beat. This is an excellent book and a wonderful debut novel (1993) of suspense that I really loved and enjoyed. It took a lot of creativity, thought and talent to come up with this plot.The book is very dark in mood as is Scott Smith's other frightening book,  The Ruins .He knows how to set the mood, introduce his characters and pace the book just right, and the writing is excellent.Highly recommended for suspense/mystery/thriller readers.

The book recommendation from Stephen King should have been a red flagI gave this 3 stars and not 2 because it was the inspiration for one of my favorite movies. I had hoped to read the book to get even more context and detail to what I found to be an engrossing story and compelling characters. Unfortunately, the book pales to the movie screen play. There is no character development, the story is really flawed and non-sensical (see below) which fortunately the screen play fixed and it is exceedingly dark and violent, unnecessarily so.The characters, so wonderfully brought to life in the movie, are like cardboard cutouts. You don't know these people, who they are, how they feel, why they are doing what they are doing, even as the main character progresses to increasingly gruesome acts of violence.Basically, if you like every book Stephen King wrote (including the majority of which that are bad), you will love this one. If you are looking for rich characters, a thought provoking narrative and a compelling ending, chances are you may be wasting your time with this book. I know I did.[SPOILER ALERT]In the movie, there is a character arc where the main character progresses, or perhaps spirals to a point where, through happenstance, bad decisions, impulse, greed or a combination of all of the above, he confronts the fact that he *may* have become evil, from his misdeeds. This is still largely ambiguous as he retains emotion, sympathy, guilt etc. In the book, the main character is a stone-cold, emotionless sociopath, right *from the beginning*, who shotguns his own brother, barely without a thought, in the process of cold-bloodedly murdering an innocent neighbor in a very sadistic way (forcing him to strip first and beating him). Later in the book he murders another two innocent people in a convenience store with a machete. Really?Don't you think the odds of having 1 of 10, $100 bills get traced back to his wife just based on camera footage in a store (assuming they even flagged the bill) would have been less than that of being caught in a store brandishing a machete (and risking having to use it - which he did, twice)? Don't you think the clerk will call the cops, run out to see your plates, shoot you, etc? It is beyond non-sensical to just plain stupid.

Hank thought he could never do such horrible things. After he did them, he knew. Morality slipped away from Hank faster then he could ever imagine. What's one more killing when four point four million dollars are hidden under your bed. A Simple Plan is a riveting tale. The film version was altered as the story was thought too awful for movie audiences.

Masterful and dark...smart plot and gr8 characters. It will bring out every emotion in you.

Don't expect a direct precursor to the movie!

A Simple Plan is Scott Smith's first book. It caused a lot of fuss when it hit the book stands and after reading it, I can see why. I've actually reversed into this debut novel of Smith's because I read The Ruins first and fell in love with his story telling abilities based on that novel.The book has been called "A compulsive thriller which also happens to be a beautifully written and original work of art" Robert Harris. I believe him. It's such an accurate description of Smith's writing style and of the story itself that the publishers have pasted it across the front of the paperback version of the book.If you look at the Wikipedia plot description, it is a bit too simple, straightforward and a little misleading. From Wikipedia: Three men find an airplane crashed in a forest. The pilot is dead and the cockpit contains a gym bag with $4.4 million in one-hundred-dollar notes. They decide to keep the money, dividing it equally, but their plans go wrong when others come close to discovering their secret, resulting in multiple murders.Now that description would catch my interest, but it is not what the book is really about.Hank Mitchell lives in a rural area of America. He is married and his wife Sarah is expecting their first baby. His brother Jacob, a behemoth of a man, is one of life's under achievers. Jacob's best friend is drunken wastrel Lou. Lou doesn't like Hank and the feeling is mutual.Hank and Jacob's parents commit suicide when the farm that their father owned got into financial difficulties. The two brothers have little in common and don't even like each other very much. Hank is an accountant and the only bright spark in his life is his pregnant wife.Hank, Jacob and Lou make an uneasy trio of men thrown together by familial ties, circumstance and financial similarities. Hank, despite being the only employed member of this little group is basically easily led and taken advantage of. He is not strong enough morally or physically to make a stand for himself.Then one snowy morning all three men are in a pickup truck when Jacob's dog (a male named Mary Beth) jumps out of the truck to chase a fox. Both fox and dog disappear into the woods and the men go to find Mary Beth. Once in the woods they find a small crashed aircraft. They also find a dead pilot and duffel bag stuffed with money.Hank takes control of the situation and decides that if they hold onto the money for six months it will then be safe for them to split the cash and no one will be the wiser. With explicit instructions to not tell anyone about what they've found, Hank becomes the "keeper" of the money.Stress, dire financial situations, lack of secrecy and trust all begin to take their toll on the three men and as events snowball out of control, things turn murderous.This story had me gripped from the first page. Smith paints a brilliant picture of small town life and the people who inhabit it. His painting of the three (four counting Sarah) main characters made them so real and complete I felt badly for them when things got so out of hand.Hank was the main protagonist and it doesn't take long to see that he really is not up to the task at hand. Sarah becomes a big player in the action by first acting as his sounding board and then later taking a more active role in events.This tale of greed, fear and mass murder was made into a film in 1998 by Sam Raimi, starring Bill Paxton, Billy Bob Thornton, and Bridget Fonda, if it is one-quarter as good as the book, I have to see it.This was a brilliant book. A real 5 out of 5 stars for originality and for characters that leapt off the page at you, they seemed so real. If you don't read any thing else this year, read this book.While the title may be A Simple Plan, the story itself is not so simple.You can read all my reviews at MikesFilmTalk.com

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