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A review by moscat
Enchanted Creatures: Our Monsters and Their Meanings by Natalie Lawrence
informative
medium-paced
2.75
Oof. A real mixed bag. There are some fun morsels and thought provoking ideas in here, but it feels like it's trying to cram so much in that it doesn't manage to build a cogent thread to lead to some of the conclusions in the text.
There's a thread of odd, largely inconsequential, mistakes (Michael Crichton isn't a paleontologist, the Goblin King is called Jareth not Jared, phobia of snakes isn't the #1 phobia, tiger bones don't come from Africa) that make me question some of the more consequential statements in the book. The two combined make me feel this book really needed another edit pass.
I enjoyed it most when I had a bitesize chunk, I found it frustrating when it threaded these chunks together to not-always-convincing degrees. I think if it had more space or narrower focus to explore some of the more interesting ideas put forward it would be more what I'm after in this sort of book. This felt more like a tasting menu - which isn't necessarily a bad thing! - but I was hoping for something to get my teeth into.
There's a thread of odd, largely inconsequential, mistakes (Michael Crichton isn't a paleontologist, the Goblin King is called Jareth not Jared, phobia of snakes isn't the #1 phobia, tiger bones don't come from Africa) that make me question some of the more consequential statements in the book. The two combined make me feel this book really needed another edit pass.
I enjoyed it most when I had a bitesize chunk, I found it frustrating when it threaded these chunks together to not-always-convincing degrees. I think if it had more space or narrower focus to explore some of the more interesting ideas put forward it would be more what I'm after in this sort of book. This felt more like a tasting menu - which isn't necessarily a bad thing! - but I was hoping for something to get my teeth into.