sarahetc's reviews
1168 reviews

I learned that if you're Jack Kerouac, it's difficult to drink yourself to death. But if you work hard, do your best, and churn some novels out along the way, you can do it. And also that Jim Christy hates Anne Charters. And loves Gerald Nicosia. And this book is almost more about Kerouac fans than Kerouac.

I love Sarah Palin. Love her. But I'd sum up the book like so: Alaska, sports, sports, sports, Todd, sports, and then I had a baby. Blah blah blah city council, sports, and then I had another baby. Blah blah oil pipeline blah blah natural gas blah blah oil gas sports gas sports oil blah and then I had another baby. Blah blah oil gas oil gas oil gas so many natural gas pipeline details jeezopete and then I had another baby. And then I ran for Vice President of the United States but I can't really talk about what a prick John McCain is. Teh End. Love her.

This novel didn't smack me across the face with awesome, as I was led to believe it would. What am I missing?

From this little book, I learned that I remember way more of Monty Python's Drunk Philosopher's song than I thought I did. And that what might have saved the second half from near total irrelevance was a bracket-style fictional playoff between philosophers, because I really want to see John Stuart Mill give Karl Marx the smackdown.

I wanted to like this. I really did. But it was so cynical and self-indulgent, I just couldn't do it. Grossman could teach Rowling a thing or two about telling, not showing. I tried to hard to care about the characters, or the plot developments, or any part of the world and was thwarted at every turn. Even the climax made me think, "Well fucking duh." I appreciate the theme Grossman was going for, but it feels like he got drunk and whiffed it. So maybe it's a metanarrative that way.

The dialogue will stick with me, for sure. "He was either going to hit you or start a blog...." "He thinks he's really going to bone an elf." And of course I'll read the sequel. Sonofabitch.

LOVE. These books just get better and better. I say that even with my vision of Fforde now colored by his inane remarks about fanfiction.

I found this book interesting, but ultimately unremarkable. The characters seemed caricatured, and Kostova seems to substitute moral grandstanding for actual character development. Or at least use it as shorthand. Also, nobody eats that much canned soup. While I didn't dislike the book, I'm hard pressed to understand why it's so very popular.