29 January 2009

Books

Time to get back to blogging about books. It seems that that is what I used to write about (when not ranting), but does lead to the question of whether to be honest, and write about all the crappy chick-lit and mysteries I read (and I am particularly fond of the books that combine the two) or just the more worthy stuff.
It is not just that I am a snob, it is the fact that I can barely remember most of the throwaway stuff or who wrote it after I am done. Although that is increasingly true of most of what I read.
So I guess we'll just go with the memorable ones (good or bad).

Let's start with bad, and I mean bad within the conventions of the genre (in this case chick lit).

Material Girl by Louise Kean

The heroine was whiny, shallow, needy, stupid and unlikeable. The needy, whiny and shallow bit were clearly intentional, I'm not sure about the stupid and unlikeable I think we were supposed to sympathise with her. Still that wasn't was was wrong with it, it was that the book was pretentious and seriously overwritten in parts.
'Scarlet', our narrator and heroine, kept musing about London and her relationship with it like the author was trying to make the city an extra character but it was really badly done. Since it included the first few pages, I nearly stopped reading the book. It did have some funny moments, which is what I enjoy in books like this (well besides the descriptions of shoes), but not enough to make up for its faults.

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