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I Hate This Book 1/10
I'm in need of some ranting. That's reason enough to make you suffer and introduce you to ten books I really, really don't like.
Here's the first book. I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't share my opinion. This one won four prizes, among them the Booker Prize in 1997. You're welcome to rant right back at me.
Warning: Please don't click the cut if you expect a thoughtful critique.
Arundhati Roy: The God of Small Things.
I don't understand how this is supposed to be a master piece. I struggle to even start naming the things I didn't like. It was the language, the plot, the structure, the narration and the characters. Which leaves... nothing.
There's waxing, and then there is waxing, and then there is more waxing (and also, this was a fair representation of the sentence structure that is used). The author is so in love with her silly metaphors, purple prose and endless repetitions that the pages should be sticky from her salivating all over them.
This story is so edgy that it's round. This is the stuff literary critics wank over. It's also the kind of book that makes me go 'Bwuuuu?' Most likely this is because I don't understand. I don't get the message. (Imagine me making air-quotes).
Random Capitalisation Throughout The Book Was Driving Me Up The wall. (Are you wondering why I didn't capitalise wall? Good! You should.)
Plot: Everyone is a douche-nozzle. Love can conquer everything, except it really can't. Betrayal is everywhere. And I mean everywhere.
Try reading this out loud:
"To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget."
Remarkable is also the profound wisdom of paragraphs like these:
"When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That's what careless words do. They make people love you a little less."
And there were passages that simply made me burst out laughing:
"Being with him made her feel as though her soul had escaped from the narrow confines of her island country into the vast, extravagant spaces of his. He made her feel as though the world belonged to them- as though it lay before them like an opened frog on a dissecting table, begging to be examined."
Of course, there's also the huh-factor:
"Heaven opened and the water hammered down, reviving the reluctant old well, greenmossing the pigless pigsty, carpet bombing still, tea-colored puddles the way memory bombs still, tea-colored minds."
Here's the first book. I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't share my opinion. This one won four prizes, among them the Booker Prize in 1997. You're welcome to rant right back at me.
Warning: Please don't click the cut if you expect a thoughtful critique.
Arundhati Roy: The God of Small Things.
I don't understand how this is supposed to be a master piece. I struggle to even start naming the things I didn't like. It was the language, the plot, the structure, the narration and the characters. Which leaves... nothing.
There's waxing, and then there is waxing, and then there is more waxing (and also, this was a fair representation of the sentence structure that is used). The author is so in love with her silly metaphors, purple prose and endless repetitions that the pages should be sticky from her salivating all over them.
This story is so edgy that it's round. This is the stuff literary critics wank over. It's also the kind of book that makes me go 'Bwuuuu?' Most likely this is because I don't understand. I don't get the message. (Imagine me making air-quotes).
Random Capitalisation Throughout The Book Was Driving Me Up The wall. (Are you wondering why I didn't capitalise wall? Good! You should.)
Plot: Everyone is a douche-nozzle. Love can conquer everything, except it really can't. Betrayal is everywhere. And I mean everywhere.
Try reading this out loud:
"To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget."
Remarkable is also the profound wisdom of paragraphs like these:
"When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That's what careless words do. They make people love you a little less."
And there were passages that simply made me burst out laughing:
"Being with him made her feel as though her soul had escaped from the narrow confines of her island country into the vast, extravagant spaces of his. He made her feel as though the world belonged to them- as though it lay before them like an opened frog on a dissecting table, begging to be examined."
Of course, there's also the huh-factor:
"Heaven opened and the water hammered down, reviving the reluctant old well, greenmossing the pigless pigsty, carpet bombing still, tea-colored puddles the way memory bombs still, tea-colored minds."
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Please post the review on amazon. PLEASE!!!!!!!
I haven't read the book, but the title is awesome. You have to give her that. ;)
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And the air was full of Thoughts and Things to Say. But at times like these only the Small Things are ever said. The Big Things lurk unsaid inside.
Last time I posted a review on Amazon, it was deleted. Don't ask me why...
I agree with you that the title is good. So is the cover, and what I heard about the book before buying it. It was a trap.
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amazon are such shitheads! They NEED reviews such as yours. *shakes head* And I have no idea why they would delete a review by you. :)
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Now that you mention it, there are parallels. It's been a while, but I remember that 'Adler and Engel' was full of similes. It does have a plot, though, and I quite liked it.
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shitebook wins the Georg-Büchner-Preis, but in the last years I did not manage to get into a single one of them. An overboarding usage of needless and senseless similes are part of it, definitely.no subject
I have a soft spot for the dark side, though, and 'Adler und Engel' is pretty dark. It wasn't too pretentious either, but it's been a few years - my opinion might have changed. I notice that I have far less patience with books than I had then.
Are you sure you don't like similes. Let me try to convince you with this beauty (I'm sorry, but I cannot stop quoting Ms Roy):
It was a grand old house, the Ayemenem House, but aloof-looking. As though it had little to do with the people who lived in it. Like an old man with rheumy eyes watching children play, seeing only transience in their shrill elation and their wholehearted commitment to life.
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I read Hollinghurst and still am thoroughly intrigued by his books. And he won the Booker Award, too. ;)
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There are people who do read novels for the poetry and word play. And if it's woven into the story telling well enough, if it's subtle as opposed to mashed into your face like wedding cake, then I can sometimes enjoy it. I generally prefer to distil the novels themes myself by dissecting the story and structure, without having them poured over me like syrup.
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I actually think that this book was almost worth reading for all the fun things you can quote at people.
For example:
Bottom up and out. When the gurgling, bubbling sound came, she listened with her eyes. A yellow brook burbled through a mountain pass. Rahel liked all this. Holding the handbag. Everyone pissing in front of everyone. Like friends.
Like friends!!
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Thank you for the samples, I shall steer well clear of this one. :D
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*nods sagely*
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Please tell me you made that up. Please?
Shudders.
Love you. Immolate the book.
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