French Leaves Her Readers Lost In the Woods

By Barrister Russell

After suffering through Philip Roth's excruciating account of his own childhood in a world dominated by the most boring brand of Nazism I've ever read, (I didn't think it was possible to make Hitler vanilla, but alas, Roth came through) we were all hoping the next selection would be better. Hard to imagine anything not being better, unless it was written by Merriam or Webster.

Luckily for us, Tana French and her not-so-charming boyish bangs came through. She was able to write a novel that kept all of us turning the pages and burning the midnight oil to see what was going to happen next. But most of the time, what happened next was the narrator, Rob Ryan, failing miserably as a detective and losing his nerve at the most inopportune times. The story followed Ryan as he investigated a murder in his childhood hometown - the same place that he was involved in a disappearing act as a child 20 years earlier. That's right. Ryan had his own little Amber Alert when he was 12, as his two best friends were abducted and never heard from again. And conveniently for the cops, he didn't remember a single thing from the whole incident. Thus the plot was set - two murders, twenty years apart, same place, same characters. What more could you ask for?

Unfortunately, a lot. As the two stories lace in and out like a pair of worn-out Chuck Taylor's, French properly builds the storyline into something truly epic. The two laces cross over each other time after time, but brilliantly never get in the way. Chapters fly by. Clues mount up. Tension builds. Then, just as the perfect climax is built, French flicks her pen and the shoelace breaks. It happens sometimes. The knot is tied too many times that it eventually wears out from overuse. French had us tied up and twisted and thoroughly engrossed in her simultaneous plots. But in the end, she had simply created something too big and too epic to properly solve or do justice - too many knots to untangle. And what that meant for us was complete and utter disappointment. We were left feeling empty. Lost. Used. With nothing but the stench of a worn out plot in our hands.

It's frustrating to read books like this. So well-written. So well-articulated. Characters unique and memorable. Crime dialogue and jargon impeccable. Pop culture references spot-on and unforced. But sometimes, the ending is the hardest part. Maybe that's why a lot of authors start there. Or why ideas sometimes begin at the end. I don't know. But French clearly didn't either.

One other thing - I really didn't appreciate her version of herself in the story, i.e. Cassie. Talk about waxing poetically about something that will never be aesthetically pleasing in any way. Let me explain. According to French, Cassie was the youngest, most savvy detective on the Murder squad. Cassie was a woman who inexplicably avoided any form of chastising in all her years on the force. Cassie was always right. Cassie made all the breakthroughs in the case. Cassie was continuously described as beautiful in the eyes of the narrator. Cassie overcame all the odds and challenges that faced her. Cassie got married. Cassie lived happily ever after. Oh, and in reality, Cassie had a man's haircut, was admittedly pudgy, worked in a man's field and couldn't get a confession out of a suspect if she had a signed presidential pardon in her hands. And Rob, the male narrator, well his life fell apart because he couldn't handle anything. His reactions to certain breakthroughs in the case were, excuse me if I sound sexist, what the reader would expect from a female character. But all those points were cleverly and conveniently glossed over by French. Well done, sweetheart. You managed to turn a psychological crime thriller into a feminist soap box. Or at least, it seemed that way to me. And if you asked Rob, I'm sure he'd agree.

Was it better than Roth? Oh yeah. Was it a page turner? Absolutely. Was it a good book? Yes and no. It was a flawed book with glaring omissions and shortcomings. But, it was a lot of fun and a nice escape. Just gonna need a little more out of the ending next time. The Gentlemen have high standards for their literature.

Overall rating: 2.875 Beaver Pelt Hats

Barrister Lichtenauer: +2
Barrister Russell: +3.5
Barrister Shaw: +3
Barrister Wells: +3

Meeting Place: Irish author. Irish setting. Irish restaurant. Where else in Kansas City but O'Dowd's on the Country Club Plaza? Ok, there are tons of other, probably more Irish places, but we got lazy.

Next Up : Blindness by Jose Saramago

The Plot Against America by Philip Roth - or - How to Ruin a Good Idea for a Book

By Barrister Lichtenauer

The first session of the Gentlemen Bookreader's Club of America recently adjourned and it was unanimous - Philip Roth wrote a terrible book. Aside from the random mentions of masturbation and penis (described as "acorn-like"), it was chock-full of useless details.

A good term to describe this turd of a novel is Literary Masturbation. It seems Roth was in love with the fact that he did so much research, so he made sure to spurt it all over every page. Thanks Philip. Over six pages describing different stamps. Three pages detailing the Jewish social elite in 1940. He even took all the research he didn't use and threw it in the back of the book. Genius. I just read like 350 pages of your garbage, and I don't think I'll be reading your addendum.

Now, on to the plot. This book asked the question, "What would happen if Nazi-sympathizer Charles Lindbergh became president of the United States of America?" The implications and ramifications of such a fundamental shift in American ideology was a worthy subject to write about, which is most of the reason we were all so interested in reading it. The book examined this idea at a micro-level through the eyes of the Roth family. Young Philip (yep, he put himself in the book) watches as his Jewish family comes to term with their new circumstances.

Pretty provocative, huh? And the verdict? Roth managed to take all of the potential described above and wield an impossibly slow read. Boring. Tedious. Terrible. Written like an English textbook. And it's full of weird asides that never really amount to anything. For instance, the Philip character is a wimpy creep - plain and simple. He had a "game" that consisted of getting on buses and following gentiles home, or wherever they may be going. There was a whole chapter dedicated to this game. An entire chapter. And chapters were like 50 pages long. An entire chapter. I guess they call it character development, but this book would shoot for epic then go back and spend time with this minutiae. And if that "game" wasn't creepy enough, Philip also liked to steal clothes from the school nerd who lived below him. Yep. He didn't have any friends, his Dad just died and then comes Philip, stealing his clothes and getting him in trouble. Even worse, Philip literally ruins this kid's life later in the book. It's incredible. Made no sense. Completely illogical.

So. This book was horrible. Don't read it. The Gentlemen Bookreader's Club of America does not approve. Oh, and if any of you thought that Philip's "game" sounded like fun, then you're cordially invited by the The Gentlemen Bookreader's Club of America to never read our blog again.

Overall rating: 3.75 Clubbed Seals (that's bad)

Meeting Place: Dark Horse Tavern was chosen to highlight the dark horse candidacy of Charles Lindburgh from the story. It's also important to note that frequenting the Dark Horse Tavern is a somber, miserable experience - the parallels were too obvious to ignore.

Next Up: In The Woods by Tana French