There is a lot packed in this little novella, but it just isn't my jam. Steinbeck definitely creates interesting characters and a tense narrative, but the writing style and language use were grating and occasionally offensive. Obviously books are a product of their time and some of this inflammatory content was intended to be just so, but for me it took away from the power of the book and pulled me out of the story as a distraction.

The social commentary of the narrative has its merits and it draws a pretty honest picture of the way things likely could be during the Depression and Jim Crow eras. There are moments that address all kinds of prejudice and unequal treatment in this "land of the free", including misogyny, racism, and mistreatment of the mentally ill. I absolutely see the literary merit of the story, but I think there are so many pieces that contain the same kinds of commentary in much more sophisticated ways that perhaps the value of this novella as a literary device is diminishing strongly with time.