The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit

I was reading a really obscure book....by evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson -- when I Googled the author and found out something about his father, Sloan Wilson. A reporter for Time-Life after the 2nd World War, Wilson wrote stories for the New Yorker and in '55 produced the best-seller The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit.

Realizing that I had not the foggiest idea what this novel was about, I grabbed the audio version for the long commute. The book is fabulous! The story is about Tom, a family man, working in the city and worrying more or less constantly about bills, his boss, etc. In the midst of some rather trying experiences with work and family, memories of his wartime experience as a paratrooper float to the surface...with far-reaching consequences.

What caught me is the voice of the storyteller. The rather simple story is told honestly and without embellishment. Tom frets about all the humdrum things that most of us do, getting into debt, not upsetting his aged grandmother's dreams of pre-war gentility, figuring out how not to get screwed over at work...But he is hardly blind or deaf to the consequences of the suburban lifestyle his generation creates...and reacts strongly against them. Wilson tells his tale without pretense or ornamentation...a very welcome blast from the past!