Wednesday, September 07, 2005

"It's the most pointless book since How To Learn French was translated into French."

I often wonder whether the people who are quoted on the back of paperbacks have even read the book. I just finished an atrocious work of fiction, and was perturbed by the back cover's exclamations. One quote stated, "A hilarious riot". This bothered me both for the lack of "an" where "a" has been used, but it seemed clearly that the reviewer and I had read different books. The other quote, "A wise and witty read about the secret desires deep within us", seemed to give the book philosophical airs that I failed to note. The characters were selfish, and two-dimensional. The story lacked believability and depth, and felt wholly unsatisfying in its supposed humour.

The kicker is that I read the whole thing. In two days. Fuck I need a life.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Cath,
What's the name of the book? I can't not finish reading a book, even if it's a bad one (same with movies), so I avoid bad ones when I can.

btw I came across your blog by clicking on link after link after link, and it's an excellent read.
anna