The Princess Bride by William Goldman

The full title of this work is The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure ~ The "Good Parts" Version. Abridged by William Goldman. That in itself is a joke. The author writes as if he is abridging a previous work that is based on a true story, but Morgenstern, Florin, and Guilder are all completely fictional.

I had seen the movie several times before I ever read this book, and I love the movie, but it's hard to say whether the book or the movie is better. There are some more details in the book that didn't make it into the movie, but the characters were portrayed well enough in the movie that the extra details really didn't add anything to the story. There were a few slight differences between the movie and the book, and when that happened I actually prefer how it was done in the movie.

William Goldman definitely had a unique approach in writing the different editions of this book, and it was was interesting at first, but he was kind of pushing it and I got tired of it toward the end. I don't want to discourage anyone from reading the book because parts of it are really funny and remind you of the movie, but I want to warn you that the layout of the book is kind of weird.

Review by David Dunkerton