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3 reviews for:
Bar Harbor Babylon: Murder, Misfortune, and Scandal on Mount Desert Island
Leslie Landrigan, Dan Landrigan
2.67 AVERAGE
3 reviews for:
Bar Harbor Babylon: Murder, Misfortune, and Scandal on Mount Desert Island
Leslie Landrigan, Dan Landrigan
2.67 AVERAGE
This is one of those “collections of anecdotes plucked and summarized from other, better-written books about more comprehensive subjects” books. As such it’s… okay, but the authors never bother with background information on Bar Harbor, Mount Desert Island, or anything else, and the chapters aren’t arranged in chronological order, so we go from murders in the 1950s to the servant problem in the Gilded Age (which is pretty yikes, based as it is on accounts from employers) to the original theft of the island from the Abenaki people (which is even more yikes, beginning with the fact that they’re referred to repeatedly as “Indians” and continuing through the fact that, again, they’re seen pretty much entirely through the eyes of their white contemporaries - do we really need some of that quoted?).
Many of the stories have little to no relationship with Bar Harbor save that someone involved at some point owned a summer home there, which can get tedious. If I wanted to know about the Louisiana Lottery scam, I’d be reading about that. Additionally, the “summarize it” strategy means that the prose is clumsy and often kind of dumb. Like, this is the kind of book that people worry about AIs writing, honestly. And there’s a weirdly censorious turn to some of it, which makes sense when you’re coming at it from the perspective of gossips - for example the chapter on “the mad Hoyts” which is basically about a family who all struggled with mental illness and addiction while frequently making it into the tabloids for their "bad behavior" - early 20th century Britney, basically. The glib tone undoubtedly matches that of the contemporary tabloids but it’s gross when written down seventy years later; we should know better now.
Many of the stories have little to no relationship with Bar Harbor save that someone involved at some point owned a summer home there, which can get tedious. If I wanted to know about the Louisiana Lottery scam, I’d be reading about that. Additionally, the “summarize it” strategy means that the prose is clumsy and often kind of dumb. Like, this is the kind of book that people worry about AIs writing, honestly. And there’s a weirdly censorious turn to some of it, which makes sense when you’re coming at it from the perspective of gossips - for example the chapter on “the mad Hoyts” which is basically about a family who all struggled with mental illness and addiction while frequently making it into the tabloids for their "bad behavior" - early 20th century Britney, basically. The glib tone undoubtedly matches that of the contemporary tabloids but it’s gross when written down seventy years later; we should know better now.
I wanted to love this book because I love history and mystery but the authors didn't write in an engaging style and it seemed stilted and transitions were not smooth. Perhaps they were trying to take blog posts and just put them together one after another without connecting them. I read the kindle edition, so perhaps it was a formatting issue where transitions or breaks will be more clear in a printed version. I also found myself wanting a deeper story than what was included in many of the stories here.
It seems this book could be so much more with some effort and added details.
It seems this book could be so much more with some effort and added details.
informative
slow-paced
Poorly written, clearly just a compilation of blog posts. Little to no context provided for the rise and influence of the region or the people. I read one of the chapters which was all about a child conceived out of wedlock between a couple that ended up married and the husband was a well-known politician. This child ended up dying, sadly enough. I read the next chapter and it was only in reading that second chapter that I learned this aforementioned couple actually had eight children total!! This is one example of the poor writing this book contains. Would not recommend, even as a lark.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Bullying, Child death, Chronic illness, Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Gun violence, Infertility, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Abortion, Suicide attempt, Death of parent, Murder, Pregnancy