Re: RARA-AVIS: Re: Introducing Myself

From: Stewart Wilson ( stewart@stewartwilson.com)
Date: 04 Jul 2007


I read DIE A LITTLE after THE SONG IS YOU and QUEENPIN. It's true that the lyricism you describe was present in DIE, but I was very disappointed by the book as a whole. Perhaps if I had read it first I would have liked it more and SONG less. I found that many of the passages in the book, particularly descriptions of period items and decor read like the narrator was in the 21st century presenting to a 21st century reader, but that shouldn't have been the case. Also I don't think the narrator could have presented all of the goings on she did without knowing what was happening sooner. She (the narrator) came off as dumb, and uninteresting. By contrast, in THE SONG IS YOU and QUEENPIN none of those problems were present. Alan Guthrie said that Abbott has been improving between books. I would say that she improved massively between the first two. QUEENPIN is told in a very different style from SONG, I don't know if it was an improvement. SONG is my favourite book so far this year. QUEENPIN is excellent too.

Cheers,
--Stewart

On 7/4/07, dicksanddames < dicksanddames@yahoo.com> wrote:

>
> I like the adjective used by Ed in describing Megan's work as lyrical.
> I couldn't agree more. I would like to add subtle. When I started
> reading "Die a Little" I was wondering when the story was going to
> pick up. But then I caught myself sucked in "lyrically" ( is that even
> a word - :) ) and "subtlely" into a very dark story. After that I
> couldn't wait to read her next book "The Song is You". Loved it and
> immediately bought her third book "Queenpin".
>
>
>

-- 
Stewart Wilson
Toronto, ON


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