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simone_cw's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Struggled through this, started to go somewhere during act II (halfway through its 179 pages). Always been a big fan of Chuck but this one just wasn't for me.
liketheday's review against another edition
2.0
Maybe it's because I don't follow a lot of celebrity things and have never read a tell-all book, but I really really really hated all the name-dropping, made even more irritating by the fact that every proper noun was in bold face.
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ngeunit1's review against another edition
3.0
So first of all, I guess this is a step up from Chuck's most recent Pygmy. Which places this somewhere in the area of "Okay." There were some things that I did like about the book and somethings that really got in the way of that enjoyment.
First, lets start with the negative. The bold-facing name dropping does get old really fast. The point that he is trying to make is very quickly made and could have been a lot less forced. There were just too many names, and 90% of the time had absolutely zero effect on the story itself. It just took up space and felt like it was just convoluting the story. Also the book was really really short. Only about 180 pages. And it even took a bit longer than normal for the story to pick up and get into gear, and given the fact that this was only about 180 pages, meant that there was not all that much story to speak of.
Lets move on to the good stuff now. The story, while it was exciting, was good. Even though very predictable from early on, it was still exciting watching it unfold. In addition, the normal Chuck story elements are present, like the outrageous sex/murder scenes, the really morbid and a times extremely crude humor (like Webster's jokes about his manhood), and just his overall way of describing things. And that I always enjoy in his novel. I also really like the method of narrative he used. I thought it was effective to have a lot of the scenes told as if they were acted out with elements of hollywood in them. It was effective and had a very interesting (good) effect on the story.
Overall, I think this novel had some good potential derived from the elements that I listed above that I liked. Even the dropping of the darn bold faced names and a little less of it would have really made this a much more enjoyable story. But, all of this extraneous stuff just gets inbetween the story and the ability of the reader to enjoy it.
First, lets start with the negative. The bold-facing name dropping does get old really fast. The point that he is trying to make is very quickly made and could have been a lot less forced. There were just too many names, and 90% of the time had absolutely zero effect on the story itself. It just took up space and felt like it was just convoluting the story. Also the book was really really short. Only about 180 pages. And it even took a bit longer than normal for the story to pick up and get into gear, and given the fact that this was only about 180 pages, meant that there was not all that much story to speak of.
Lets move on to the good stuff now. The story, while it was exciting, was good. Even though very predictable from early on, it was still exciting watching it unfold. In addition, the normal Chuck story elements are present, like the outrageous sex/murder scenes, the really morbid and a times extremely crude humor (like Webster's jokes about his manhood), and just his overall way of describing things. And that I always enjoy in his novel. I also really like the method of narrative he used. I thought it was effective to have a lot of the scenes told as if they were acted out with elements of hollywood in them. It was effective and had a very interesting (good) effect on the story.
Overall, I think this novel had some good potential derived from the elements that I listed above that I liked. Even the dropping of the darn bold faced names and a little less of it would have really made this a much more enjoyable story. But, all of this extraneous stuff just gets inbetween the story and the ability of the reader to enjoy it.
mldias's review against another edition
3.0
Light years more readable than [b:Pygmy|4601396|Pygmy|Chuck Palahniuk|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1255623525s/4601396.jpg|4651129], but far from Palahniuk's best effort.
banrions's review against another edition
2.0
This was my first Chuck book. It was interesting. I am a huge fan of movie stars from the 40s and 50s era and thought it would be a quick interesting read. I was right. It is written like a movie which was cool but a little difficult to really get into at times. The boldface name dropping got a little old after a while. The ended for me, totally came out of nowhere which I loved, I almost gave it another star just for that, but decided against it. It wasn't anything special, but it was definitely interesting.
moz_art's review against another edition
dark
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
kralaa's review
1.0
Woof. This was awful. The supposed plot of this book (caretaker tells tale of old Hollywood star falling in love with younger man and discovering he intends to kill her) only takes up about 10% of the book. The rest is reserved for a constant name dropping of old movie stars I’ve never heard of. All the characters were awful and flat. I’m happy it was a short read.