Campbell Andrews > Recent Status Updates

"The fiancees to be reassessed."

There is a whole other novel in those 5 words. This novel is wonderfully dense.

"While fathers played sublimated sexual games with their nubile teenaged daughters"

In this book, everybody's the worst

Haven't read a Chabon in a while. no question he can write but this seems a little self-indulgent, like a glorified photo album. not feeling it yet.

Duh.

It was obvious 100 pages ago. OK, so the point is that this mom is willfully blind to what's in front of her- but it's hard to identify with a character who's that obtuse.

Ms. Abbott does more in the first 80 pages of this book than most novels do in several hundred.

But there's still the problem of structuring it as a big reveal; if you don't know on page 88 what's actually happened, you're not paying attention.

Selena.

Christina Grimmie.

Rebecca Schaeffer.

These are the names of some of the entertainers whose lives have ended at the hands of fans.

Where does fandom end and obsession begin? What, if anything, do celebrites owe their fans?

These are fascinating, relevant questions which Bob Proehl seems disinclined to ask.

the weirdness of the central incident that drives the novel... I don't think Mr. Proehl quite understands what novel he's writing.

there's so much FEELing here. I expect Mr. Proehl is a very, very nice man.

all well & good, but doesn't mean a person's a good writer.

(also I hate these narratives constructed as revelations, where we're waiting hundreds of pages to learn what we could have been told from the start.)

and yet anOther new character... and from our proverbial betters, the sexual minority class!

I do like how he's made up all his comics. would that he had done the same for his other references.

I fear there's too many characters, and not enough story.

this chapter's titled The Sense of an Ending.

Julian Barnes reference?

lapsing into sitcom convention....

might be better as an oral history of comicons.

some nice stuff here but he's still deciding how he wants to tell his story...

already hoping they get together... that make me a shipper??

boy is this thing a freight train last 60 pages or so. damn.

balls on this guy. saves the funniest scene for the denouement.

entering the home stretch with the requisite, patented Winslow dread... facing the inevitable executioner's chop

Damn, he's so crisp. Hallmark of a pro? Never a question who's talking. All the dialogue is immediately, innately attributable.

Winslow tightens the noose, sheesh

*whew*

Man- Winslow sets you up, then knocks you down.

When they do a survey of early 21st century literary fiction I'm pretty sure they'll say 'Boy, they were depressed.'

Hurricane Katrina is good enough reason to despair but even readers need more than a slog... 100 pages in and I don't see much reason to continue.

Writing can be exquisite like empty calories can taste wonderful.