Alicia
Ergh. I so wanted to be completely blown away by this book, to get so wrapped up in this intricate story that Pessl had created of films and plots and secret family histories and the pseudo-paparazzi attempting to break into this seemingly magical world created by the brilliant reclusive film director and the artists who attend his side. This is a book that I unconsciously have always wished to have been written, and have always wanted to read.
Perhaps my unknowing personal investment in the success and believably and fullness of this story is what turned me away from it with such disappointment. I did feel the necessity to read this one through to the end, seeing the time and effort I had put into it as far as I'd gotten without much payoff. A few quick points on my frustrations:
1) Too much and too little. As a thriller, there are very few thrills. Clues are laid out simply and delicately, and although there is a wealth of information and “evidence”, everything is conveniently packaged to deliver our protagonists to exactly what they seek, and without much effort. The plotting is full of so much detail - background and minutiae about Cordova's films, artifacts from news media and fan websites littered throughout the book as “hints,” even a separate app (which I couldn't get to install on my device) which added a multimedia element to the narrative - but so very bereft of any weight or feeling of cohesion. So we have a giant pile of facts and information and so what? It seemed, at times, that I could have been sifting through the apocryphal remains of every single one of the ideas of one writer that never were used.
2) So many italics! I appreciate the effort that was put forth to add emphasis to at least one word in nearly every sentence in the book, but I do not appreciate the assumption that I need to be led to understand that everyone is extraordinarily excited about everything they say. Quite the opposite from making me feel the excitement, it just felt overly bored and heavy with effort. These people needed desperately to convince me to feel excited about what they were saying and they pushed me just too, too hard.
3) All of our characters - even the elusive Cordova - felt flat, if not merely derivative and lazy. I couldn't have cared any less about seeing any of these individuals through to their goals; Scott was simple and self involved and not particularly bright; Hopper was James walked straight out of Twin Peaks and into New York City, still in love with his Laura Palmer/Ashley Cordova; an attempt to write Nora as lost, fierce, frightened, determined, and fated came out as a broken 11-year-old with a wacky wardrobe and no more reason than any of the others. Even Cordova was a cobbled together Kubrick-Jodorowsky blankness that felt more of an omission by mistake than mystery.
I always seem to forget that Dexter of the novels and Dexter of the television exist in two separate universes, universes in which Deb is either privy to Dexter's hobby or ignorant of it, universes in which Doakes is dead or alive, universes in which Rita is dead or alive... There's a lot of Schrodinger-ing that goes on for me before I open a book or start a new season...
This book felt like a return to the delicious form of the first of Lindsay's Dexter stories, but perhaps it is just because I have been so long without Dexter of the television that I was more forgiving of the failures of the storytelling to begin with. However, as the tale of the shadow wore on, I found myself so bored - exposition for ages, and then ten pages of brick throwing! child snatching! boat jumping! shark attacking! sneaky escape! Phew. Not enough tension for the short and conclusive burst of intensity that we finished on.
Darling Dexter has lost his Dastardly Charm in his old age, and his inability to move beyond his inanities(he's obsessed with how he has lost his edge - YES WE SEE THAT, TOO!) and failure to fight having fallen into the married life mask he tried so carefully to create.
I really wanted for this book to engage me: a self-absorbed English literature student who feels completely out of his league having come to Oxford from a small village, leaving his younger girlfriend at home when he goes off to university, and falling in love (or fantasy) with the posh and seemingly perfect girl of his dreams. His entire life is inside of his head, is words, is trying to get the structure of his plotting and utterances perfect, but it rarely turns out that way. Our protagonist isn't particularly sympathetic, though, and understandably so, as we get to know him through his thoughts over a night of particularly excessive drinking (abnormally normal is implied), and wallowing in self pitying, and being generally incapable of making any sort of decision other than to not progress with his life in any meaningful way.
A very funny, real, and intriguing nonfiction graphic novel, about a young woman discovering that the epic life she believed her father led may not have been the truth. Laurie's story is painfully honest - in contrast to the fantasies she was fed as a child - and is the portrait of a woman becoming whole.
WOW WOW WOW WOW WOW! Great piece! Thrilling end to the War on Frogs! The return of The Black Flame! Lobster Johnson reaches his final “resting” place! (Maybe we'll see him again. I certainly hope we do.) Johann has resumed his “form” and has been released from the ghost of the Lobster. We've got hints of a future where Hellboy has returned to his position with the B.P.R.D. - photograhic evidence of the future! The Ogdru Hem are gone, for a while at least. Let's catch our breath with something a bit different for now. Some crazy international stuff, with political intrigue!
Questions regarding Abe's species: I can't believe that he would be a future incarnation of the frog people, but in this universe, it does seem a likelier story than being inhabited - taken over? consumed by? - an alien species, especially since his origin story comes nearer the beginning of this series. But I just don't feel that this storyline had so much plotting to it to have allowed for such a major revelation to have been so carefully planned... I don't feel like Davis and Mignola write these characters with a clear idea of who they are going to become and where they're coming from. They are so organic and human.
Questions regarding Liz' powers: So... she's in Bangkok (and, as a side note, what's with the dickish French?) and she needs a light for her cig? She's never been one for masking her power in public, which I kind of love about her. Does the new, international gig, sanctioned by the UN, disincline her to scare people with flaming fingertips? Or is this the big bang, grand finale of the firestarter that we've been waiting for? Memnan Saa has hinted that this was the battle she was born to fight - and win. If we've won, does Liz no longer have any powers because they would no longer have a purpose?
Just great. Just absolutely great. ‘Scuse me now, while I go get the B.P.R.D. emblem tattoed onto my body.
Another political, adult thriller from one of my new favorite authors. What a wonder to discover someone who has been writing such engaging and thought-provoking books for such a long time! Wallander is a fascinating mope, and I really adore his commitment to his melancholy and his life: his misery doesn't stop him from being a genuinely good person.
