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3.32 AVERAGE
3.32 AVERAGE
This guy! His writing style just sucks me right in... I can’t get enough.
I'm always excited to hear about a new Tom Perrotta novel. His books are just so damn entertaining. They're funny but also smart and compulsively readable. His latest is no exception. That said, I'm sure this novel won't appeal to everyone. The prose is pretty expository at times and the subject matter (current sexual politics--such as consent and Internet pornography) is going to put some people off. But I really enjoyed it.
Oh dear, I like Tom Perrotta, but this book just left me cold. It started out well enough, but about the time we switched POV from Mrs Fletcher herself to her obnoxious teenage son, I began to worry. I do not care about this character's point of view. We meet more characters that I don't care about. I'm beginning to fear that no plot is taking form and this entire book is just going to flip back and forth between these characters with nothing much of interest ever happening and I am going to be so fed up I will go to the end and read the discussion questions to see if anything is going to occur that I might care about. I will about doze off even trying to read those. I will be very glad that I am not in school and don't have to answer stupid essay questions. In fact, I might think I can just dump the rest of this book now.
"And of course they used her like a disposable object, without regret or apology, because that’s what privilege is—the license to treat other people like shit while still getting to believe that you’re a good person."
A solid enough listen that I’d check out the series if we still had HBO. Alas….
A solid enough listen that I’d check out the series if we still had HBO. Alas….
This is such a trashy, mediocre book and you can just tell that a man wrote it. At times it was a fascinating look at sex and gender. He touched on some things that were deep. He had insights that intrigued me. I thought it was going to go to some fun places, but instead it was all sensational - a lot of shock value and little of substance even though all the ingredients were there for something of substance to be written. I don't know what the hell the point of this book was. Some folks are calling this satirical and just... no. There was no satire. When I was about halfway through it, I thought it was leading to an outstanding conclusion, but nope. Again, you can tell a man wrote this.
How? The female characters have a lot of thoughts and feelings about their breasts. He knows just enough about feminism to trick you into thinking he's a real feminist. A sweet character is sexually assaulted and the perp is the one whose regret we get to see the most of. Victim's POV falls off soon after. Another sweet character is kidnapped and we're made to feel sympathy for the perp again. A trans lady is presented for angst and for the other characters to learn about trans people (same with autism). Her POV falls off after a hugely triggering scene. Oh, and there's a hyperfocus on porn. MILF porn in particular. The lone sex scene in the book reads like a porno and probably the author's teenage fantasy. And this is only the things I can think of off the top of my head.
It's almost like, for every effort the author made to be unproblematic in the first and second act, he got into the third act and promptly undid it. I wish I knew why. There are some very good lines and some progressive things being said and done and thought by the characters. The POVs work and don't work - because we only get three for like half the book and then we're given four more in the second half of the book and they drop off at such random points in the story, it made me ask - why were they even included in the first place?
There is a self-awareness in this book that other books by white men could probably learn from. But it's almost like he ran out of ideas or something. Like he couldn't follow through with whatever he was originally planning or like he started one with one intention and then halfway in, got a better idea and never went back to make sure the first half and the second half made sense.
So 2/5 stars. It was OK. I enjoyed the good parts. I liked the protagonist. There were many funny and shocking moments but it was all due to the sordid, low-brow, trashy nature of things, not because it was a hilarious, stand-out book that really impressed me or blew me away.
How? The female characters have a lot of thoughts and feelings about their breasts. He knows just enough about feminism to trick you into thinking he's a real feminist. A sweet character is sexually assaulted and the perp is the one whose regret we get to see the most of. Victim's POV falls off soon after. Another sweet character is kidnapped and we're made to feel sympathy for the perp again. A trans lady is presented for angst and for the other characters to learn about trans people (same with autism). Her POV falls off after a hugely triggering scene. Oh, and there's a hyperfocus on porn. MILF porn in particular. The lone sex scene in the book reads like a porno and probably the author's teenage fantasy. And this is only the things I can think of off the top of my head.
It's almost like, for every effort the author made to be unproblematic in the first and second act, he got into the third act and promptly undid it. I wish I knew why. There are some very good lines and some progressive things being said and done and thought by the characters. The POVs work and don't work - because we only get three for like half the book and then we're given four more in the second half of the book and they drop off at such random points in the story, it made me ask - why were they even included in the first place?
There is a self-awareness in this book that other books by white men could probably learn from. But it's almost like he ran out of ideas or something. Like he couldn't follow through with whatever he was originally planning or like he started one with one intention and then halfway in, got a better idea and never went back to make sure the first half and the second half made sense.
So 2/5 stars. It was OK. I enjoyed the good parts. I liked the protagonist. There were many funny and shocking moments but it was all due to the sordid, low-brow, trashy nature of things, not because it was a hilarious, stand-out book that really impressed me or blew me away.
This book was interesting. While it had a story line that kept you wondering what was going to happen next, it was a little all over the place. I couldn’t get into the characters and I overall felt that it was an odd book.
I have read many of Tom Perrotta's books and definitely wanted to read this one. It's a little better than 3 stars I feel like most of the main male characters in his books are sort of jerks with no real redeeming qualities. I don't think Brenden was particularly likable or changed much as a character through the book. The take on gender was decent. Some characters and plot lines were better fleshed out than others. A quick read.
I can't explain quite why I like Tom Perrotta but there's something about his writing and his characters that really hits a sweet spot for me.
I adore Perrotta's writing, and this book was an enjoyable addition to my shelf. The main character, Mrs. Fletcher, was just such a hot mess of awesomeness. Her son was so familiar that it almost made me wince. This book didn't challenge me to think of any of the characters in unexpected ways, but it was just delightful to read.
Leans heavily on titillation, but still manages some ok character development.