Stone Reader

Thirty years after he bought The Stones of Summer, by Dow Mossman, Mark Moskowitz finally managed to finish it. It's a work of genius - just as the original New York Times book review claimed. He looks for other novels by Mossman, but there aren't any. So he picks up his film camera and decides to find out what happened to one of the most talented novelists of the 20th century, an author all but forgotten by history. Along the way, the bookish Moskowitz compares notes and musings about the nature of novel writing and the vagaries of literary success with Frank Conroy, Leslie Fiedler, Mossman's old agent, his writing teacher, and the author of the Times review. Subtle, tangential and discursive, in the engaging first person singular manner of Ross McElwee, this film will delight bibliophiles - and indeed anyone who likes to read. Happily, Moskowitz has rekindled interest in The Stones of Summer and a new edition has appeared in the States.