The Rum Diary - Hunter S. Thompson
Editor’s Note: We will give you the ‘Demon Digest’ version of Hunter S. Thompson’s National Best Seller, The Rum Diary. This will be an ongoing series for our viewers and fans of Hunter’s writings.
Hunter’s main character, Paul Kemp, a reporter from New York City. It is set in the early 1950′s. Kemp makes his way to Puerto Rico to write for a paper in hopes of finding adventures in the tropical town. He also likes to toss the drinks down with the best of them.
We start off with Paul getting drunk with friends in New York the night of the flight to PR. Paul gets to the airport fucking hammered. While waiting for his flight to PR, he notices that a pretty blonde will be on the his flight. The flight is packed and he tries to save a seat for the hottie but gets cock-blocked from an old man who steals the seat. The combination of many pre-flight cocktails and no sleep lend to Paul’s slugging and jerking the old man around on the plane.
Kemp arrives in Puerto Rico and basically is on a quest to find something to eat. He also takes a cab to try and find his newspaper office that he will now be working for. He arrives at the office to while some Puerto Ricans protesters are fighting with a american man at the entrance of his building. Turns out there is a labor strike going on and the American man is also a new reporter who started a few months earlier.
Paul meets some of his counterparts which all turn out to have their own unique quirks. Some tell him the paper will be going out of business soon. Kemp gets worried since he just left NYC to start his new adventure. We learn that the news business is full of all sorts of personalities including drunks, degenerates and loons as well as talented, honest men.
Kemp starts to get his feet wet and begins researching the paper he his now working for and learning the ins and outs of Puerto Rico.
It also turns out the hot blonde on the plane is one of his new associate’s girlfriend.
-Steele
