This morning, I finished a novella by J.D. Salinger entitled 'Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters.' The copy I got is rather old, having sold originally for $0.75 and then, much later, selling again to my mother at an old used book store I used to frequent as a child for apparently $0.50. I don't know when the bookstore closed - I am assuming it has by now. I bought some of my first novels there, though. Lots of good memories came out of that place.
My mother had given me this copy as she was thinning out her book collection. I love J.D. Salinger and had not read either of the novellas in this particular volume. This first story weighs in at less than a hundred pages. It tells the tale of Seymour, a brother of the protagonist, who doesn't show up for his own wedding. The wedding guests depart and the reader follows the protagonist in a car along with some guests of the bride, Muriel. Their commute to visit with Muriel after the wedding gets interrupted by a parade of all things. The group leave the car and go to the protagonist's apartment, which is rather close to where their commute got interrupted, for both air conditioning and to use the phone.
Seymour, who also shares that apartment, was not there. A phone call is made to Muriel's place to explain their delay and to catch up on whatever had happened since the sudden ending of the wedding. It is learned from that phone call that Seymour and Muriel eloped.
Seymour's later death is mentioned almost in passing early in the book as he took his own life six or eight or something years after his marriage while in vacation with his wife in Florida. Not much else is said about that, but the protagonist does spend some time leafing through Seymour's diary while in his apartment. It's touching and the narration by the protagonist is also touching. He loved his brother.
I'm not sure what the rest of this book holds regarding Seymour's story. I'll find out soon when I read the second novella. J.D. Salinger was a tremendous writer, though, and it's a treat that there are still several works by him I haven't read yet.