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A review by truantmemphis
John Dies at the End by David Wong
4.0
John Dies at the End Review: Pseudo-Spoiler Alert!
I just finished this and I have one minor complaint to insinuate right away. It involves the title. I will let you guess what I took issue with, until the end of this review. Then I will straight tell you.
Fun read. I enjoyed Wong's narrative style. Strong humor and interesting plot. I admit when I finished the story I felt like the end sort of petered out a little bit, but at the same time I enjoyed the follow through with the characters.
A few other minor complaints...
-Unless I missed it, the origin/explanation of the soy sauce never happens. I may have been reading too fast and glossed over, or potentially already forgot 'cause I'm usually on my own version of the sauce when reading at night, but I felt like a crucial element of the story was never fully formed. I'm okay with things being left unsaid at times, I just felt like the sauce lost some its relevance along the way, despite the fact that the effects of using it remained part of the narrative for the main characters.
-I feel like as this story developed as a serial, there is a possibility as it gained attention and moved into novel form that Wong knew it would be a series of books. I know that book series are kind of the thing nowadays, especially with a lot of indie authors and hardcore genre readers, but I don't read that way. Thus, I prefer a book that feels like it stands alone, even if it winds up as part of a series. I guess there was just something that didn't quite feel right for me once finished with the book. I wish I could put it more eloquently. Perhaps, in my head, there was simply more of the story left unexplained than I was comfortable with.
All of that said, again, while in the moment, I definitely enjoyed the narrative and humor. It was a fun read, so I don't want to finish the review on too negative a note, other than to circle back to my opening about the title. And like the book, despite my promise to "straight tell you" what aspect of the title I took issue with, just as the novel's title made an unfulfilled promise, so did I.
Get it?
I just finished this and I have one minor complaint to insinuate right away. It involves the title. I will let you guess what I took issue with, until the end of this review. Then I will straight tell you.
Fun read. I enjoyed Wong's narrative style. Strong humor and interesting plot. I admit when I finished the story I felt like the end sort of petered out a little bit, but at the same time I enjoyed the follow through with the characters.
A few other minor complaints...
-Unless I missed it, the origin/explanation of the soy sauce never happens. I may have been reading too fast and glossed over, or potentially already forgot 'cause I'm usually on my own version of the sauce when reading at night, but I felt like a crucial element of the story was never fully formed. I'm okay with things being left unsaid at times, I just felt like the sauce lost some its relevance along the way, despite the fact that the effects of using it remained part of the narrative for the main characters.
-I feel like as this story developed as a serial, there is a possibility as it gained attention and moved into novel form that Wong knew it would be a series of books. I know that book series are kind of the thing nowadays, especially with a lot of indie authors and hardcore genre readers, but I don't read that way. Thus, I prefer a book that feels like it stands alone, even if it winds up as part of a series. I guess there was just something that didn't quite feel right for me once finished with the book. I wish I could put it more eloquently. Perhaps, in my head, there was simply more of the story left unexplained than I was comfortable with.
All of that said, again, while in the moment, I definitely enjoyed the narrative and humor. It was a fun read, so I don't want to finish the review on too negative a note, other than to circle back to my opening about the title. And like the book, despite my promise to "straight tell you" what aspect of the title I took issue with, just as the novel's title made an unfulfilled promise, so did I.
Get it?