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A review by rbruehlman
Spare by Prince Harry
slow-paced
2.0
Good God, through much suffering and pain, I managed to finish this dreadful book. I think I would have enjoyed watching paint dry better.
This book started out deceptively okay and interesting! It gave a very heartwrenching, vivid depiction of Princess Diana's death and the impact that it had on Harry. I felt for him. I can't imagine, truly, what it would have been like to have your mother pass away at that age and have both her death and your grief up for public scrutiny. It's cruel and inhuman, and no child should ever be subjected to that. Some people say that the Royal Family is supported by British taxes, and therefore the public is entitled to know about their lives, but does a child get to choose that? And, really, even if you opt out of it, the press still follows you. Constant scrutiny is a hefty price you pay on merit of your mere birth. I wouldn't wish it on anyone.
So that part of the book was good. I was actually pretty impressed by the writing; I have to imagine it was ghost-written, but whoever ghost-wrote it was exceptionally good at drawing a scene and making it all very easy to mentally visualize. It really helped drive home the anguish Harry felt as a child.
However, that highly detailed writing style was also the death of the entire book. The entire book is written in excruciating detail. Even the bits that don't matter. God, there were so many bits that didn't matter. I think Harry just did a brain dump of every single memory he ever possessed, and it was written into this book. Harry is a mere mortal like the rest of us, which means the minutiae of his life are ... utterly boring. Scores of pages are dedicated to pointless and detailed anecdotes that are fine at first, but just start to drag after a while. I don't care you played a practical joke on some schmo; can you get on with the important bits of your life already? It's like Lord of the Rings, except nonfiction, where it goes on for excruciating pages about nothing. At least Tolkien was trying to create lore and worldbuilding! Harry's excuse ... I have no idea.
So, as my patience waned, the rest of the book got progressively more and more boring, until it reached a fever pitch and I started getting aggressively bored.
And then Harry himself started to irritate me.
To be clear, I empathize with Harry's situation of being a royal hounded by the paparazzi, 100%. I would never, ever, ever want to be a royal or a celebrity. It's not all it's chalked up to be. Everything you do is under a microscope, up for scrutiny by the public at large. You can't make mistakes as a teen; you can't go anywhere or do anyone without being followed by paparazzis. You lose relationships with people who understandably don't want that life for themselves and opt out of it. At least a celebrity signs up for it (although I don't think even they appreciate what they're signing up for). A royal is stuck with it on merit of their birth.
And I think I would find it hard to ignore the press beating up and spinning stories about me, too. I've always wondered about celebrity rag magazines--they always cite "pals," "sources," "friends," etc., dishing on salacious details about a celebrity's marital troubles or drug issues. Who are these friends, I've always wondered? Hardly friends if they're gossiping to a rag magazine like that. If I was a celebrity having a very private issue and it was leaked to the press, you'd better bet I'd be hellbent on figuring out which of my friends did it and drop the friendship ASAP. Fool me once, maybe, but never again. It makes sense now that many of the stories are simply made up, but to stand by and have your name slandered would be hard for me, too. The personality the press makes up about you has to rub off on you a little.
So I have sympathy for Harry. But it just got old hearing him complain again and again and again about his family and how everyone was out to get him. Toxic families do exist, and I can totally see how the royal family's strange position in society could twist a family dynamic. So, you know, maybe Queen Elizabeth and Charles and William and Kate are awful, toxic people. Who knows! I'm not there. But I found Harry's exploration of their character wanting--who were they beyond intolerant, cruel characters who were supposedly hellbent on hating Harry and Meg? They felt like mere caricatures. Everyone in Harry's book is presented as black-or-white, all-good or all-bad. I suspect there is more nuance than he lets on. Also, what of the rest of the royal family, the ones that aren't under nearly as constant press scrutiny? They were never mentioned--how do they feel about Harry and his situation?
I dunno. After a certain point, between the overexplaining of every life detail and the caricaturization of his family members, I did begin to wonder if Harry was part of the problem. Maybe his family is problematic. The two can be true at the same time. But Harry never, not once, ever, analyzes his role in the family dynamic, even though Harry hints at immature behavior all throughout his twenties. Everyone else is mean and out to get him. The constant one-sided complaining just added to the overall dreary boringness.
Whatever, I don't really care. I'm glad he found solace moving away from the UK, and I hope it all works out for him. Wish him the best. Was still a stupefyingly boring book.
This book started out deceptively okay and interesting! It gave a very heartwrenching, vivid depiction of Princess Diana's death and the impact that it had on Harry. I felt for him. I can't imagine, truly, what it would have been like to have your mother pass away at that age and have both her death and your grief up for public scrutiny. It's cruel and inhuman, and no child should ever be subjected to that. Some people say that the Royal Family is supported by British taxes, and therefore the public is entitled to know about their lives, but does a child get to choose that? And, really, even if you opt out of it, the press still follows you. Constant scrutiny is a hefty price you pay on merit of your mere birth. I wouldn't wish it on anyone.
So that part of the book was good. I was actually pretty impressed by the writing; I have to imagine it was ghost-written, but whoever ghost-wrote it was exceptionally good at drawing a scene and making it all very easy to mentally visualize. It really helped drive home the anguish Harry felt as a child.
However, that highly detailed writing style was also the death of the entire book. The entire book is written in excruciating detail. Even the bits that don't matter. God, there were so many bits that didn't matter. I think Harry just did a brain dump of every single memory he ever possessed, and it was written into this book. Harry is a mere mortal like the rest of us, which means the minutiae of his life are ... utterly boring. Scores of pages are dedicated to pointless and detailed anecdotes that are fine at first, but just start to drag after a while. I don't care you played a practical joke on some schmo; can you get on with the important bits of your life already? It's like Lord of the Rings, except nonfiction, where it goes on for excruciating pages about nothing. At least Tolkien was trying to create lore and worldbuilding! Harry's excuse ... I have no idea.
So, as my patience waned, the rest of the book got progressively more and more boring, until it reached a fever pitch and I started getting aggressively bored.
And then Harry himself started to irritate me.
To be clear, I empathize with Harry's situation of being a royal hounded by the paparazzi, 100%. I would never, ever, ever want to be a royal or a celebrity. It's not all it's chalked up to be. Everything you do is under a microscope, up for scrutiny by the public at large. You can't make mistakes as a teen; you can't go anywhere or do anyone without being followed by paparazzis. You lose relationships with people who understandably don't want that life for themselves and opt out of it. At least a celebrity signs up for it (although I don't think even they appreciate what they're signing up for). A royal is stuck with it on merit of their birth.
And I think I would find it hard to ignore the press beating up and spinning stories about me, too. I've always wondered about celebrity rag magazines--they always cite "pals," "sources," "friends," etc., dishing on salacious details about a celebrity's marital troubles or drug issues. Who are these friends, I've always wondered? Hardly friends if they're gossiping to a rag magazine like that. If I was a celebrity having a very private issue and it was leaked to the press, you'd better bet I'd be hellbent on figuring out which of my friends did it and drop the friendship ASAP. Fool me once, maybe, but never again. It makes sense now that many of the stories are simply made up, but to stand by and have your name slandered would be hard for me, too. The personality the press makes up about you has to rub off on you a little.
So I have sympathy for Harry. But it just got old hearing him complain again and again and again about his family and how everyone was out to get him. Toxic families do exist, and I can totally see how the royal family's strange position in society could twist a family dynamic. So, you know, maybe Queen Elizabeth and Charles and William and Kate are awful, toxic people. Who knows! I'm not there. But I found Harry's exploration of their character wanting--who were they beyond intolerant, cruel characters who were supposedly hellbent on hating Harry and Meg? They felt like mere caricatures. Everyone in Harry's book is presented as black-or-white, all-good or all-bad. I suspect there is more nuance than he lets on. Also, what of the rest of the royal family, the ones that aren't under nearly as constant press scrutiny? They were never mentioned--how do they feel about Harry and his situation?
I dunno. After a certain point, between the overexplaining of every life detail and the caricaturization of his family members, I did begin to wonder if Harry was part of the problem. Maybe his family is problematic. The two can be true at the same time. But Harry never, not once, ever, analyzes his role in the family dynamic, even though Harry hints at immature behavior all throughout his twenties. Everyone else is mean and out to get him. The constant one-sided complaining just added to the overall dreary boringness.
Whatever, I don't really care. I'm glad he found solace moving away from the UK, and I hope it all works out for him. Wish him the best. Was still a stupefyingly boring book.