Tag: 2 1/2 Stars Page 2 of 4

Blood Storm Magic (Audiobook) by Jayne Faith, Amy Landon (Narrator): The series comes to a dramatic yet dissatisfying end

By HCNewton

On June 15, 2020

In Audiobook

Blood Storm Magic

by Jayne Faith, Amy Landon (Narrator)
Series: Ella Grey, #4

Unabridged Audiobook, 7 hrs., 32 min.
Tantor Audio, 2018

Read: May 12-13, 2020
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

Faith has a lot to wrap up in this conclusion to her Ella Gray series. There’s the re-rescue of Ella’s brother, the deal with her magic, the completion of her partner’s storyline, the situation with her coven (especially the leader of it), her roommate’s romantic situation, and a few strings—Faith even throws in a new romantic interest for Ella.

And, well, she does wrap it all up. Most of it felt rushed, like she was going to get it all wrapped up in X number of pages come Hades or high-water. Some of it was too convenient. Some of it was fitting. Some was tragic. All of it was hurried.

I really did enjoy the dragon character and all we learned about him.

I wish that Faith had turned this into an ongoing series with a focus on the Supernatural Crimes while finding a way to resolve the other storylines—I enjoyed those characters and thought that whole thing had a lot more life in it. She could’ve done that and even kept the coven in the background. But…that’s just me.

This series started strong and promising, and then it petered out. I’m glad I got to see how someone would use Boise in an Urban Fantasy, but was disappointed in the end. The coworker who turned me on to the series disagrees with my overall take on it, she’s probably in the majority.

2 1/2 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, opinions are my own.

Fleishman is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner: This novel is as Troubled as the Eponym

By HCNewton

On November 5, 2019

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, In Medias Res

Fleishman is in Trouble

by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

Hardcover, 373 pg.
Random House, 2019

Read: October 22-23, 2019

Hr, which was what his preferred dating app was called, was now his first-thing-in-the-morning check. It had replaced Facebook, since when he looked at Facebook, he became despondent and overwhelmed by the number of people he hadn’t yet told about his divorce. But Facebook was also a landscape of roads not taken and moments of bliss, real or staged, that he couldn’t bear. The marriages that seemed plain and the posts that seemed incidental and not pointed, because they telegraphed not an aggressively great status in life but a just-fine one, those were the ones that left him clutching his heart. Toby hadn’t dreamed of great and transcendent things for his marriage. He had parents. He wasn’t an idiot. He just wanted regular, silly things in life, like stability and emotional support and a low-grade contentedness. Why couldn’t he just have regular, silly things? His former intern Sari posted a picture of herself bowling at a school fundraiser with her husband. She’d apparently gotten three Strikes. “What a night,” she’d written. Toby had stared at it with the overwhelming desire to write “Enjoy this for now” or “All desire is death.” It was best to stay off Facebook.

Back with my In Medias Res post about this book, I pretty much covered everything I want to say about this book. I was hoping that the last half would pick up (and I almost decided it did). But, really, it just kept doing what it had been and ended up killing almost all my interest in the book.

The official blurb says:

Toby Fleishman thought he knew what to expect when he and his wife of almost fifteen years separated: weekends and every other holiday with the kids, some residual bitterness, the occasional moment of tension in their co-parenting negotiations. He could not have predicted that one day, in the middle of his summer of sexual emancipation, Rachel would just drop their two children off at his place and simply not return. He had been working so hard to find equilibrium in his single life. The winds of his optimism, long dormant, had finally begun to pick up. Now this.

As Toby tries to figure out where Rachel went, all while juggling his patients at the hospital, his never-ending parental duties, and his new app-assisted sexual popularity, his tidy narrative of the spurned husband with the too-ambitious wife is his sole consolation. But if Toby ever wants to truly understand what happened to Rachel and what happened to his marriage, he is going to have to consider that he might not have seen things all that clearly in the first place.

A searing, utterly unvarnished debut, Fleishman Is in Trouble is an insightful, unsettling, often hilarious exploration of a culture trying to navigate the fault lines of an institution that has proven to be worthy of our great wariness and our great hope.

I’d summarize it as: two messed-up people in a very troubled marriage (that had been troubled for a while), going through a divorce and bringing out the worst in each other and themselves. Hurting careers, friendships, their children and each other along the way. By the time we meet them, they’re like many going through a bitter divorce, and are (at least then) terrible, horrible, no good, very bad people doing terrible, horrible, no good, very bad things to each other (while exonerating themselves of all but a few faults). And this is supposed to be comedic.

All of which could have been addressed years ago if they’d just talked to each other and worked together, rather than keeping score, justifying themselves, assuming the worst of each other and holding grudges. But that’s neither here nor there.

There were some saving graces:

Brodesser-Akner’s writing, there are some great passages, great insights, and sentences worthy of praise, study, and quotation. As I said previously, the prose is delightful, there are turns of phrase that I’ve stopped to re-read. Brodesser-Akner has a sharp wit and an equally sharp eye for observation/social commentary. If/When she publishes a second novel, the technical aspects of b>Fleishman is in Trouble were strong enough that I’ll be back.
When Toby (a hepatologist) is at work and caring for patients and/or instructing his interns, he’s a great character. Inspirational even. I’d read a book about him at work dealing with the bureaucracy of a hospital, insurance companies, young doctors and suffering patients and probably do little beside sing its praises. This, it should be stressed, is not that book.
Toby’s friend Libby. I don’t approve of (not that she asked)/appreciate a lot of her choices and attitudes. But she feels real, she’s genuine, she’s relatable (even—especially—when she’s treating her husband like garbage for no good reason), she deals with her problems (and her friends) in a way that most readers can see themselves in. She actually has a greater role in the novel than you think she will in the first half (or more), but the book would really benefit for more of her.

I have neither the time, inclination, or interest in listing my problems with this novel—just see my summary of the novel as a whole, and we’ll call it good.

Based on some of what I’ve read about this novel, and my own observations, you could get away with calling this a Feminist John Updike. Which is a pretty good summation of why I wouldn’t recommend it, actually. It’s also reductionistic, so you probably shouldn’t say it. However, if a Feminist Updike sounds like something you’d really enjoy (not just are mildly curious about)—you might find yourself enjoying this.

2 1/2 Stars

August by Jim Lusby: This troubled cop mystery just didn’t work for me

By HCNewton

On February 25, 2019

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Technically, I read is as part of Fahrenbruary, but think I’ll skip the tagging and linking for obvious reasons.
—

August

by Jim Lusby

Kindle Edition, 226 pg.
Fahrenheit Press, 2018
Read: February 19 – 20, 2019

It’s time for another round of, I don’t care enough about this to make too much effort, so here’s the Publisher’s blurb: (I’ve got to come up with a shorter name for that)

Detective Sergeant Jack Mason’s search for an escaped convict is derailed by the discovery of the bodies of three teenagers in the crypt of a deconsecrated church.

Initially the case looks to be straightforward – teenage drug experimentation gone wrong, ending in a tragic double murder and suicide.

Tragic but no great mystery.

Some hope. Much to Mason’s annoyance any chance of a quick resolution become a distant hope when evidence of occult rituals are uncovered at the murder scene.

Jack Mason has no choice but to follow the case wherever it leads. As a result he finds himself embroiled in the dark underside of modern Irish society where the establishment closes ranks to ignore the spectre of institutional child abuse, where organised crime gangs operate an increasingly violent drug trade, and where populist politicians build their reputations whipping up hysteria over immigration.

As the complicated case unfolds, deeply buried memories from Mason’s past begin to resurface causing the competing demands of the investigation and his increasingly chaotic personal life to become almost overwhelming.

If the first 60% or so of the book had been as good as the last 40 I’d probably be raving about August, but I just could not connect in any way with the story, Mason or the other characters until that point — and somewhere around there it felt like the book changed and became interested in the crime, and the way that Mason’s past, the city’s elite, the crime and various gangs intersected.

But before then we got this strange combination of a new partner — with a mysterious past that’s totally unexplained (but hey, he knows a lot about occult rituals in the area), a looming threat from the regional police bureaucracy, and Mason’s self-destructive (and very unbelievable) lifestyle dominating the narrative. Maybe, maybe all of this works for other readers, but to me it felt coming in media res without ever getting the context explained to me. There’s far too much about what happened in the book that I don’t understand for me to recommend the book.

But the last part of the book redeemed the effort, and I found it compelling, so I can’t completely give a bad review to this.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Hardcore Twenty-Four by Janet Evanovich: A Swing-and-a-Miss from a Typically Reliable Source

By HCNewton

On December 26, 2018

In Fiction, Janet Evanovich, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Stephanie Plum

Hardcore Twenty-Four

by Janet Evanovich
Series: Stephanie Plum, #24

Mass Market Paperback, 275 pg.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2017
Read: December 25, 2018

I dropped Lula off at the office and went to my parents’ house to mooch lunch. They live five minutes from the office, five minutes from Morelli’s house, and a time warp away from me. Even when my mom gets a new refrigerator or buys new curtains the house still feels precisely the same as when I was in school. It’s equally comforting and disturbing.

At this point the series feels a lot like Stephanie’s childhood home — they all feel the same, which is comforting and disturbing for the reader. This book ended up serving as a prime example of that.

I was feeling pretty good early on, when Connie was giving Stephanie a couple of new FTA’s to go pick up — they seemed equally interesting and potentially amusing. There’s a man who got upset by the poor service he received at a coffee shop and shot up a few cars in the parking lot, and a “pharmaceutical activist” who was arrested after blowing up a meth lab he was using in an abandoned building.

Actually, the travails of the slippery fifty-two year old who threw a tantrum and his eccentric wife is a pretty fun storyline. But the story of Zero Slick gets derailed right away by antics around his political activism and then leads into the major plot-line of the novel about a potential Zombie-outbreak — that both Zero and Lula seem to be overly focused on. That ties into a series of crimes where heads are being stolen from corpses at the various undertakers in town.

Yup. Zombies. Oh, and Diesel shows up. I was so glad that he wasn’t around anymore, it actually took some effort to remember who he was. Throw in an online boyfriend for Grandma Mazur and things are overfull with the zaniness.

I spent so much of the book just wanting it over — I did appreciate the story-line about the shooter — and a couple of other FTA’s that Stephanie picked up. I liked almost everything about Morelli for a change. The Ranger flirtation (and things beyond it), not to mention the Diesel flirting, the Zombie story (even when Evanovich tries to ground it in reality), and the Mazur stories just didn’t work for me. A little too crazy, a little too would=be comedic, without success.

I like the series, as often as I grumble about it — but this was beyond grumbling. I honestly had a hard time remembering why I keep reading these. They used to be funny, now I settle for amusing and almost charming. But I know Evanovich is capable of more, and I hope she gets back to form soon – even if it’s a diminished form. I’ll be back for Look Alive Twenty-Five, but my anticipation will be muted.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

You Had Me at Woof (Audiobook) by Julie Klam, Karen White: A meandering mess of vaguely dog-related memoirs.

By HCNewton

On November 19, 2018

In (Auto)Biography, 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Library Love Challenge, Audiobook, Dogs

You Had Me at Woof: How Dogs Taught Me the Secrets of Happiness

by Julie Klam, Karen White (Narrator)

Unabridged Audiobook, 5 hrs., 44 mins
Tantor Audio, 2010
Read: November 1 – 6, 2018

From the Publisher’s Site:

Julie Klam was thirty, single, and working as a part-time clerk in an insurance company, wondering if she would ever meet the man she could spend the rest of her life with. And then it happened. She met the irresistible Otto, her first in a long line of Boston terriers, and fell instantly in love.

You Had Me at Woof is the often hilarious and always sincere story of how one woman discovered life’s most important lessons from her relationships with her canine companions. From Otto, Julie realized what it might feel like to find “the one.” She learned to share her home, her heart, and her limited resources with another, and she found an authentic friend in the process. But that was just the beginning. Over the years her brood has grown to one husband, one daughter, and several Boston terriers. And although she had much to learn about how to care for them—walks at 2 a.m., vet visits, behavior problems—she was surprised and delighted to find that her dogs had more wisdom to convey to her than she had ever dreamed. And caring for them has made her a better person—and completely and utterly opened her heart.

Riotously funny and unexpectedly poignant, You Had Me at Woof recounts the hidden surprises, pleasures, and revelations of letting any mutt, beagle, terrier, or bulldog go charging through your world.

Spend much time around this blog and you’ll know I’m a sucker for dogs — real or fictional — if a book has a strong dog element in it, I’m sold. This should’ve been right up my alley. I expected to really dig it — but the reality didn’t match my expectation.

These meandering personal essays/memoirs are organized by lessons taught by various dogs, sure, but they didn’t seem as well-organized as those from similar books by Dave Barry or David Rosenfelt (or maybe it’s just guys named David that think like this). I didn’t think the voice was very consistent throughout — I frequently couldn’t tell if I was supposed to be laughing with Klam or at her. Or maybe I shouldn’t have been laughing at all. I didn’t find a lot to relate to — or even grab on to — in some of the anecdotes, other than a sense of pity for the two-legged individuals in her family and life. (that came out a little harsher than I intended, but I’m sticking with it).

I can’t point at anything in particular — other than her unessential and unsubtle celebrity name-dropping — that I didn’t like. I guess I found the thing too unfocused, too inconsistent, and not enough about the actual dogs. It seemed to be more about her in relation to various dogs. To an extent that’s true with the aforementioned books by the various David’s, too — but I don’t think it’s as much about them (although, I never wondered who I was supposed to be laughing at with them).

Is it possible that my problems with the book are in the narration? Sure, a lot of it comes down to understanding Klam’s voice, and Karen White’s interpretation of that could be affecting me enough to not appreciate the book. But I don’t think so — I can’t imagine an audiobook director or publisher is going to let something that disconnected from the text be produced, and White seemed to match the text and context with what she was doing. Granted that’s hard to know without reading the text independently, but I don’t care that much. If the text is really that slippery, that’s on Klam anyway, not White.

Oh, here’s something I really appreciated about the book — Klam talks at least twice about dog owners who will replace a beloved pet with one of the same breed and general appearance and give it the same name (sometimes several times). This answers a question I asked a couple of weeks ago. Even knowing this is a thing that people who aren’t Robert B. Parker or Robert B. Parker characters do, it’s still messed up. Happily, Klam agrees.

The concluding anecdote was good — maybe a bit too much, really — but it was sweet. And the section about dealing with the death (expected or not) of a dog was really strong. That’s why I’m not listing this as 2 Stars or fewer. There’s some really decent writing here, but the voice was inconsistent, the whole thing felt too self-serving, and . . . well, there’s just something intangible that happens between the reader and the text, and I just didn’t like this one. It’s not a bad book, per se. But it’s not a good one.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Greek Mythology: Beyond Mount Olympus by in60learning

By HCNewton

On March 12, 2018

In History

Greek Mythology: Beyond Mount Olympus

by in60learning
Series: in60Learning
</brKindle Edition, 38 pg.
in60Learning, 2018

Read: March 10, 2018

“It’s not by chance what Americans say when in need of a specialized or precise term, that ‘the Greeks have the word for it’.” -Aikaterini Spanakaki-Kapetanopoulos

Let me start by saying that I still think that the in60Learning project is a great idea and I hope it puts out a lot of material. I just hope that in their rush for quantity, they don’t skimp on quality. From the typographical errors to the way this was written, I think that’s a real danger.

Still, let’s focus on this volume — they really did go beyond Mount Olympus in their coverage of Greek Mythology, let’s look at the contents of this book:
An Overview of Greek Mythology
The Creation
The Gods of Mount Olympus
Other Gods, Spirits and the Stars
The Underworld and Other Beings in Greek Mythology
The Human Race and the Gods
Greek Mythology in Today’s World
That’s a lot for anyone to tackle in a book much longer than this — it’s a Herculean effort to get that much into a book this small (pun fully intended). But they go for more than an overview of Greek Mythology, they try to suggest some deeper meanings, to tie their topic into philosophical discussions and the like. Some of that worked, some of that seemed like a stretch — and some fell flat (that last paragraph, in particular, was a complete mess). You’ve got to admire the effort, though.

Not only did they cover a wide range of topics, but they worked in a lot of detail — maybe too much in some instances (including the Roman equivalent names at some points felt like they were striving for word count rather than being thorough).

One of the main theses of the book is the impact that Greek Myth had on Western Culture/the English Language, as is seen in the quotation I borrowed above and they utilized to drive home the point. Not only did they prove this point (in case anyone thought it worthy of debating), but they overdid it. At a certain point, the sections along these lines just became lists:

From the Greek god of sleep, Hypnos, is derived the word hypnosis.
From the Greek legend of the King Tantalus, is derived the word tantalize. He was condemned for eternity to stand up to his chin in the middle of a river with a fruit tree above him. Whenever he tried to drink the water, it receded from him, or grab a fruit, it pulled away from him.
From the Greek god of love, Eros, is derived the word erotic.
From the Greek goddess of love, Aphrodite, is derived the word aphrodisiac. . . .
From the god of fire and blacksmithing, Vulcan (Greek: Hephaestus), is derived the words volcano and vulcanizing.
From the Roman goddess of grain and farming, Ceres (Greek: Demeter), is derived the word cereal.

That goes on for pages (depending how you have your text size set). The facts are good, they’re on point, but it’s not good reading.

The basic overview of the Olympian myths, the origin of the universe, the war with the Titans, etc. was pretty solid. Nothing remarkable, but decently executed. The writing as a whole, however, didn’t impress me — frequently, but particularly as the authors tried to wrap up each chapter, the writing felt like it was lifted from High School term papers. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing, but I got the impression that this series was supposed to be better than that.

This one didn’t work for me, but I bet there are people out there who will be helped by it. These people didn’t check out D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths so many times from 3^rd to 6^th grade that the library might as well have given me a copy (not counting the other books on the subject I read, reread, bought, etc. at that age) or haven’t had kids during the Riordan-era of publishing. Basically, I should’ve skipped this one, I think. This slim volume took some big swings — amount of material, range of material, a couple of the “Big Ideas” running through the book, and whiffed on them all (to stick with the metaphor, I do think it caught a piece of a couple of the pitches). A strong effort, but not one that worked for me.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Golden Gremlin by Rod A. Walters

By HCNewton

On February 20, 2018

In 2018 First Reads Challenge, 2018 Indie-Fever Challenge, Book Tour

Golden Gremlin: A Vigorous Push from Misanthropes and Geezers

by Rod A. Walters

Kindle Edition, 228 pg.
Omega Man Press, 2016

Read: February 1 – 2, 2018

Edmund Kean (1787 – 1833) — or someone else, it’s unclear — said “Dying is easy. Comedy is hard.” Stand-ups, actors, and writers alike will testify to at least the latter. The downside is that those that do the hard work, those that are good at comedy make it look easy. Too often it seems that people (professional and amateur alike) go for the easy approach, and it’s never a good idea.

There’s also no accounting for taste.

I’ll accept either as the explanation for why this book left me underwhelmed.

Walters assumes a curmudgeonly tone, calling himself a misanthrope and taking shots at the foibles of the culture around him. The younger set is a particularly favorite target. Too often his pieces come across as angry Facebook rants, written by someone who spouts off against social media. Still, his points are occasionally clever and his jokes show promise. If he’d subject each of these two a few more revision passes, I could imagine myself enjoying many of these.

I’d strongly encourage reading this in small bursts — the essays don’t build on each other, there’s some references between the two, but nothing you won’t remember even after a few days. I wouldn’t do more than one or two in a sitting or Walters’ charm will wear thin.

Walters says that he wrote to make Dave Barry and Ben Stein laugh. If he’d invoked Andy Rooney, I might have agreed with him. I didn’t dislike the book, but I sure didn’t like it. Walters was frequently amusing — and I have no trouble thinking that many would find him funny. But not me. At least not without a few more drafts.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion and participation in this book tour.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Moshe Comes to Visit by Tehila Sade Moyal, Fatima Pires (Illustrator)

By HCNewton

On November 3, 2017

In Fiction, YA/MG/Children's Books

Moshe Comes to Visit

by Tehila Sade Moyal, Fatima Pires (Illustrator)

Kindle Edition, 30 pg.
Simple Story, 2017

Read: November 2, 20017

I feel like saying anything less than positive about this cute little book is the equivalent of kicking a puppy. Which doesn’t mean that this is going to be glowing, it just means that I’m already feeling bad about what I’m going to say.

Martin hears something that scares him in the night — a classic starting point for a kid’s book — and his parents try to help him find the monsters. They turn on the lights, look through his room, etc. This is all well and good so far, until we get the couplet: “In this manner, several nights go by, / With no apparent fear in either parent’s eyes.” Huh? The parent’s aren’t scared? Isn’t that the point? Anyway, Dad gets the idea to write “an agreement with fears.”

This agreement is the key to the book — there’s even a blank Agreement form in the back for the reader’s own use. Sadly, I don’t understand the agreement — and I can’t imagine that I’m the only parent who’d like to try something like this, but can’t figure out exactly what’s supposed to be the point.

We transition from this to Martin’s mother beings scared by something in her bathroom. Great idea — even moms and dads get scared. It turns out that Mom’s scared by a cockroach — a talking ‘roach, I should stress — who Martin befriends. I like, I really like this part of the story. And then to help Mom deal with her fear of Moshe, Martin comes up with an agreement for his mom like the one they came up with earlier for him. I even kind of understood this one.

As soon as it’s accomplished, Moshe leaves and the book’s over. What? I don’t get it. This book is supposed to help kids deal with their fears — and it might, work in the original language,but in English . . . . nope.

Pires’ art was fine. Nothing fantastic, but that’s it. I’d have appreciated a smaller cockroach, but if he can talk, maybe he’s like one of Narnia’s Talking Beasts and has to be larger. I’m not sure. Otherwise, that was fine.

It’s cute, and comes close to working, but just doesn’t. A little editing, a little clarifying, and maybe you have a cute book that helps kids with fears. Right now, it just doesn’t.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the author in exchange for my honest opinion.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Not a Drill (Audiobook) by Lee Child, Dick Hill

By HCNewton

On April 10, 2017

In Audiobook, Fiction, Jack Reacher, Lee Child, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Not a Drill

by Lee Child, Dick Hill (Narrator)
Series: Jack Reacher, #18.5
Unabridged Audiobook, 1 hr., 27 min.
Random House Audio, 2014

Read: March 14, 2017

Reacher sets out for the Canadian border, to make it as far north on this Interstate as possible, just because. Not too far south from there, he stops in a tourist-y town, a haven for backpackers, hikers, wilderness types in general. Before he leaves, a whole lot of military types show up and block access to the forest from the town (well, they try to — the forest is pretty big, it’s impossible to block access to the whole thing).

This gets Reacher’s curiosity piqued and he starts poking around to see if he can understand why.

I don’t want to sound bloodthirsty here, but not a single fight. No threat of violence breaking out. Mostly, it’s Reacher walking around and observing things before making a heck of a guess/deduction that proved to be right.

Dark, cynical ending — one of Child’s more political statements.

Hill was okay, not terribly interesting, but I think that’s Child’s fault this time.

It’s not bad. It’s just disappointing, short and . . . bleh. Proof that they can’t all be winners, I guess.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

Pipeliner by Shawn Hartje

By HCNewton

On March 21, 2017

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, YA/MG/Children's Books

Pipeliner

by Shawn Hartje

Kindle Edition, 248 pg.
Helen Springs Press, 2016

Read: March 14 – 15, 2016

I just don’t know what to say about this one. It’s a coming-of-age story about a young man in the 1990’s growing up in (what I believe is) a fictionalized Idaho Falls, Idaho. It’s arguable how much Jason Krabb actually comes of age here — you could make a pretty decent case that he regresses throughout the book.

Jason’s main goal in life is to become a rock star in Portland, OR or Seattle, WA — along the way, he’d like to have a girlfriend and party a lot. He spends a lot of time and energy becoming pretty mediocre at guitar, and hangs out with a poser who’s new to town and a couple of older friends who are more interested in scholastic success and their futures (a concept Jason can’t really wrap his brain around). He’s got an older brother studying at Princeton and dating a nursing student, a very successful mother and a less-successful father who’s browbeat by the other constantly.

The writing is uninspired and dull, there’s no life to it at all — just a dry recitation of what’s going on. To be fair, there’s a bit of flair displayed when he writes little Lake Wobegone-inspired descriptions of things from Jason’s mother’s perspective, but I never saw the point of those, they didn’t seem to add anything. The sex scenes are perfunctory and clumsy (fitting for a seventeen year-old’s initial fumblings, I guess), at least those involving Jason. The one with Jason’s parents was just . . . odd and unnecessary. There were a couple of anachronisms that bugged me, but by and large, his history is good — he captures the feeling of the time, while maybe overplaying the pre-dawn of the Internet as we know it a little bit.

Were I an LDS youth of that era, I might be offended at the depiction of both the straight-laced LDS and the backsliders. If I were someone who spent time with a lot of LDS at the time depicted in the book, I might say it was pretty accurate. Either way, it’s going to be divisive.

There’s nothing new here — stylistically, narratively, or in terms of character. It’s all cliché, it’s not original, there’s nothing here you haven’t seen before — and likely better. It’s not bad, but it’s not worth your time and effort. While reading it, I spent a lot of time annoyed by the book — but there’s nothing to rant about here. At Hartje tried to do something, but like Jason, did the bare minimum and it shows (not unlike what I did here).

Disclaimer: I received this book from the author in exchange for this post — sorry Mr. Hartje.

—–

2 1/2 Stars