Tuesday, September 2, 2008

On My Shelf

I finished The Dud Avocado and, while I found it entertaining and there were several funny, keen obersvations that I dog-eared, I didn't love it. In fact, I loathed the narrator. I know she's supposed to be a callow flibberdigibit, but I found that there was an unconscious entitlement and lack of self-awareness to the author's tone that I found most unappealing. (Sure she's a privileged character, but see: Holden Caulfield.) Then too, there were several devolutions into farce which I found gratuitous and unwelcome.

Now I'm reading The Fox in the Attic by Richard Hughes and while I'm enjoying it, I'm braced for the appearance of Hitler a as a character (as threatened by the blurb) since I particularly dislike historical figures just popping up in fictional narratives. Sort of the same way I feel about fake governments, really.

1 comment:

CPR recertification said...

Wow! This post provides yet even more details about the trial of which I was unaware. I read Six Days or Forever, about the Scopes trial years ago, but it focused so much on the media-circus aspect of the trial that the details of how Scopes came to be prosecuted were lost under the rest of the story. Thanks for posting this, it's always good to have history clarified so we don't fall into the trap of mythologizing it.