Friday, January 27, 2012

Review: Second Reading


Second Reading
Second Reading by Jonathan Yardley

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



How on earth is one supposed to review a book of book reviews. If my reviews are one day collected into a printed edition (ha!) will I be kicking of some crazy infinite recursion of books of reviews of book reviews? It's turtles all the way down.

Anyway, on to the actual book review. I liked it. Jonathan Yardley is a very engaging writer, even when he basically says the same thing over and over and over again. With, I think, three exceptions, his review of a book is as follows. "This book is amazing, it's prose is magnificent, that this book has fallen out of favor amongst the literati is a crime against art and humanity."

And, adding to my cognitive dissonance, I'm not sure I even *agree* with him. I mean, I can definitely get behind hating on Catcher in the Rye (one of the three less than glowing reviews), and I do adore Mark Twain, Roald Dahl, and The Elements of Style. But calling Steinbeck a writer of limited gifts? Yikes! Furthermore, Yardley adores novels of manners which I cannot stand.

One of my personal literary pet peeves is the use of "well written" and "poorly written" as descriptors, without explanation or defense. Yardley's own personal version of this is to present the reader with a paragraph-length snippet of the novel at hand, and then proclaim that the writing's worth is evident. Well, sometimes yes and sometimes no. Everyone notices different things about a written passage, people respond emotionally to different word choices, etc. Yardley is certainly entitled to his opinions (and indeed, I paid for them...) but a little more detailed exploration of the chosen quotes would have gone a long way towards making this book more interesting and less repetitive.

A few other minor gripes: The worst reviews are the ones where we are merely given a plot synopsis, the best, like the review of Fanny Hill give some context for historical importance, underlying themes, literary merit, and cultural impact of a given book. And, although Yardley reviews a single detective story, there is not a single science fiction or fantasy pick (No, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court does *not* count). And Yardley has the temerity to accuse others of narrow mindedness. Sheesh.




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Monday, January 2, 2012

Review: Against the Wind


Against the Wind
Against the Wind by J.F. Freedman

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



The first 100 pages of this book are amazing. First off, the main character has a wonderfully distinct voice, and his almost stream-of-consciousness narrative about being a burned out, alcoholic, soon-to-be-twice divorced defense lawyer learning about and dealing with a one-night stand, his betrayal at the hands of his law-firm partners, and a set of bizarre new clients, accused of murder, that fall into his lap is giddy and unrelenting. The brief, somewhat horrifying, omniscient narration of the lifestyles of those clients, is similarly compelling.

Unfortunately, this book is 450 pages long. As we get into the meat of the book, the trial of the lawyers clients, it pretty much falls apart. For one thing, because of the omniscient narrator, we know the truth, at least in terms of the biker's guilt or innocense, so there's no tension there. And since they are really the only threatening thing in this book, and they literally spend 430 out of 450 pages locked up, there's really not much suspense.

The various subplots which seem to exist either to provide an excuse for there to be more sex, or to explain that the gang-rapist bikers really aren't so bad after all, and it's ok to be rooting for them to get off. Not exactly satisfying, that. And the deus-ex-machina ending, makes the whole thing feel kind of silly.

The worst part is, as the lawyer gets his life straightened out, so too does his voice mellow. Since that was the most engaging part of the book, it really takes a downhill slide.

Bottom line. I enjoyed reading it. It moves swiftly. It was a fun legal thriller. But, man I wish the whole thing had the energy of those first 100 pages.



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