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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1059856.The_Dud_Avocado?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="The Dud Avocado" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1180635422m/1059856.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1059856.The_Dud_Avocado?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">The Dud Avocado</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/158821.Elaine_Dundy">Elaine Dundy</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7841217?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 4 of 5 stars The introduction to this book talks about how it's caught in a cycle of being forgotten and then rediscovered. I can see why. Sally Jay Gorce is a terrifically charming narrator: carefree and alive, but also naive, silly, and shallow. How else could she possibly get away with crying out "The world is wide, wide, wide, and I am young, young, young, and we're all going to live forever!" I spent a significant chunk of the book trying to decide if I wanted to kiss her or shake her.
 
 The trouble is that she's in the wrong book. First of all, she needs a foil -- a Horatio to her Hamlet. There are a number of characters here who, even if they stand no chance of matching her, could at least have stood next to her, but the book picks them each up and discards them before they have the slightest of chances of gaining a foothold. Uncle Roger, Bax, Judy, Max ... Dundy needed to give a damn about one of them for more than a few pages at a time.
 
 Secondly, the plot. The passport, the white slavery/prostitution ring, the fascination with bullfighters, the backstory behind "Running for my life," the whirlwind romance and marriage to Max. Maybe it's just me, but this is not the material for young Sally Jay. There was the germ of something really great here, but it just gets lost beneath an avalanche of material. Maybe it could have worked as a madcap, goofy bit of fluff, but it's taken just a little too seriously, dragging the reader along a path that doesn't really need to be trod.
 
 Don't get me wrong. This is a delightful little read, and I'd happily pick up a sequel. It's just that there's something a little off about The Dud Avocado. I'm a little bothered by the fact that it didn't manage to be other than it was.
 
 Although I must confess that I'm more than a little in love with the line, "I thought of sex and sin; of my body and all the men in the world who would never sleep with it."
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/375171?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Joseph's review
rating:
recommended for: World travellers and Bon Vivants

The introduction to this book talks about how it's caught in a cycle of being forgotten and then rediscovered. I can see why. Sally Jay Gorce is a terrifically charming narrator: carefree and alive, but also naive, silly, and shallow. How else could she possibly get away with crying out "The world is wide, wide, wide, and I am young, young, young, and we're all going to live forever!" I spent a significant chunk of the book trying to decide if I wanted to kiss her or shake her.

The trouble is that she's in the wrong book. First of all, she needs a foil -- a Horatio to her Hamlet. There are a number of characters here who, even if they stand no chance of matching her, could at least have stood next to her, but the book picks them each up and discards them before they have the slightest of chances of gaining a foothold. Uncle Roger, Bax, Judy, Max ... Dundy needed to give a damn about one of them for more than a few pages at a time.

Secondly, the plot. The passpo...more

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message 1: by Beth

06/06/2008 02:38PM

do you still have your copy to swap/sell? thanks.