The Nightingale

-by Kristin Hannah

(epub)

It appears I am not the only one perplexed by the acclaim this book has received by countless reviewers. Granted, the novel is well-liked by those responding to something in the story that evidently touched them personally; however, I failed to have such an experience.

While the struggles and trials of the characters are weighty, the writing was such that it lent neither power, nor a moving quality to them. The characters themselves seemed two-dimensional and ultimately, failed to strike a chord. 

While facts and events surrounding WWII were obviously quite well-researched, the tale itself was over-written and melodramatic, lacking in depth. The tepid, clichéd writing style was overly distracting and, at times, downright cheesy. The reader is all but told what to feel by the author, with copious adverbs and adjectives, which merely detracted from a plot that actually had a lot of potential. I'll be giving her other books a miss.

Mrs. Dalloway

Mrs. Dalloway
-by Virginia Woolf

My Rating: 2 / 5

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf? Me! Me!

Sure she's supposedly lyrical and "la-tee-da". And this book is supposedly haunting and important. And it no doubt has its place in literature ...er... somewhere. But quite honestly, I'd be more willing to watch paint dry than read it again.

The story details a entire day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway, in high society England, post WWI, as she hurries about London preparing for a inner party to be held later that evening. Complete with flashbacks, it is penned in the "stream of consciousness" narrative mode, that Woolf is well known for, which I must admit isn't my cup of tea generally. This is no doubt why Dalloway didn't appeal to me on so many levels.

It should be read with the approach of a long-winded prose-poem, instead of a novel, with no set plot - a book that goes nowhere. So if you enjoy that kind of a writing style, this will be one for you.

In any case, speaking only for myself, Mrs. Dalloway is one of the dullest books I have ever read.

JPod

JPod
-by Douglas Coupland
448 pages (2005)

Book Rule #15: Sequels are always disappointing.

Coupland’s' JPod is no exception to that rule. Although never blatantly publicized as a ‘sequel’, it is hypothetically purported to be Coupland’s new millennia answer to his early 1990s geek epic, Microserfs.

My comparison, Microserfs vs. JPod, in short?

Microserfs, in my opinion, was Coupland’s zenith of writing aptitude — fresh and original with ‘real’ characters that many a geek could relate to. The microserfs made you want to care about what happened to them. The story actually went somewhere.

JPod? Stale as 3-week-old bread, artificial as Twin Equal ‘sugar’ packets, featuring two-dimensional unbelievable characters. Gone are the refreshingly all-too-human disillusioned "microserfs" with their witty repertoires and flat foods. They are replaced with JPod'ers — dusky, gutter-mouthed and aimless, with their couldn’t-care-less-about-anything attitudes. The result? We could care less about them. Coupled with an implausible, over-the-top, and insipid plot, it is a novel that evokes apathy and indfference. Coupland’s frequent referrals (blatant plugs) to his other works of fiction were uncomfortable and tawdry.

Not that there weren’t any redeeming qualities in the book. The reader is treated to a few remaining bits of Microserfs-esque laurels — the memoir-like narrative, the fun cubicle surveys (“if you were to sell yourself as an item on eBay”) and splash pages with binary, spam, and technical what-not. However, it was not enough to compensate for JPod's weak plot and characters, which ultimately made the novel uninteresting and difficult to finish. As much as I wanted to like it, I didn’t. At all.

It was mentioned by a friend and fellow Microserf-aficionado that it’s “harder for authors to write like disenchanted young people when they have been rich and famous for 20 years.”

I agree 101% and couldn’t put it better myself.

07/15/2006

The Da Vinci Code

The Da Vinci Code 
-by Dan Brown
454 pages (2003) 



disappointing and over-done

After the renowned curator of the Louvre has been found murdered inside the museum, Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon teams up with French police cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, to uncover an ancient secret that many are willing to die to protect. Secret societies and baffling ciphers are encountered as they track an intricate trail of clues ingeniously hidden in the works of Leonardo Da Vinci. International intrigue and the obligatory danger ensues.

Where I’m usually one to avoid something that seems to be popular amongst the masses, this time I was curious to see what all the hype was about regarding Brown’s The Da Vinci Code. Remind me never again to follow suit. 

All brawn and no brains. The Da Vinci Code seems to be a testimony to such a statement. The plot, while  multifarious, in-depth, and complicated, feels forced and reads like an implausible made-for-tv screenplay, falling deftly between a Tomb Raider and Indiana Jones sequel.

The entire scheme of the book is over-written, the style predicable and prosaic, and the characters somewhat two-dimensional. Amidst the blatant social statements and ambitious manifestos against established religion in general, Brown seems to have forgotten the all important writer's mantra that "less is more."

Where the novel was somewhat diverting, I wouldn’t recommend it for those looking for a invigorating mind exercise of any kind. In my humble opinion, it is just another bit of modern fluff incognito, using Leonardo Da Vinci as an imposing smoke-screen attempting, unsuccessfully, to be clever.

02/14/2005