jackieeh 's review for:

Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan

2.0

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Gah, gah, gah. "You like spies," multiple people said. "Read this book." What they should have been saying was, "You like prolonged descriptions of women who exist solely to flit from one misguided and chemistry-free affair with dubiously powerful men to another. Read this book."

The problem is, I don't like prolonged descriptions, etc., etc., and I never will.

Forget that this isn't really about a spy. Forget that this isn't even really about a voracious reader. I still wouldn't like it on the basis of how it's essentially about a woman who exists solely to cater to the whims and fantasies

Spoiler

of the author. And I think I mean Tom Haley, but I might mean someone else.

Gah.

There was one fleeting bright spot. In the midst of their umpteenth round of "love-making" (vom), Serena looks at a dude and, "Tell him now, I kept thinking. Tell him what you do." This is not a bad distillation of the urges experienced by so many spies in all those (better, better, so much better) books I read for my thesis, especially when it came to loved ones. Those people are always a liability, which is probably why Serena is so amazingly terrible at her job. She has no sense of subtlety, and she falls in love with everyone.

"Shall we say we have reservations about your professionalism."

SHALL WE.