A review by shimmeringice
Seduced by Story: The Use and Abuse of Narrative by Peter Brooks

challenging informative reflective slow-paced

2.5

Unfortunately, the premise was more interesting than the execution in this book. I wish that the author went more into comparison of a time/format where people relied less on narrative to argue. I agreed on the premise that 'our story' had taken over every form of other casual rhetoric, but it was hard for me to imagine what exactly the alternative was. Brooks consistently mentions that argument and rhetoric used to be different before the narrative turn, but he doesn't go in depth into how. 

On the other hand, I did actually quite enjoy the discussion about 18th century French literature's preoccupation with the origins and 'truth' of a story, and I think that the last section about narrative in the legal context was interesting, if a bit underdeveloped.