Apr 13 2005
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell: A Boring Novel
I buy most of my new books at Costco because they’re cheap, even though the selection is limited. A couple of months ago I bought Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke for $18.59 (Canadian). It’s about 800 pages, the size of dense homemade loaf of bread, and boring. What a disappointment. Here’s some of the praise it’s received:
A reader more distractible than I am might yawn for 300 pages running and still discover several book-length stretches to enjoy. I never yawned.
Susanna Clarke writes like an angel.
They’re full of shit. I not just yawned; it put me to sleep. The writing is long-winded and pompous, where the author tries to create a world full of magicians and fantasy, which just doesn’t work: the dialogue is humdrum, the characters are dull and predictable, and the environment is cartoonish.
I don’t know why this book is winning awards.
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Tags: books, susanna clarke
I was skimming through a few of the 100 or so letters I wrote to you (Jody) in the early ’90s, and noticed that I talk a lot about books. The language is usually concise with none of the pretentiousness that comes from writing for academics — so it probably reads better than most of the crap I post here. As I gradually read my way through these old letters in the next few months, if I find excerpts that would make good book reviews, I’ll post them.
Awww… I’m kind of sorry to hear you didn’t like it. It makes my copy look all that much more huge and unconquerable.
A book unconquerable by THE rebecca? Just take the 15 minutes and read it!
Pender - ha ha :) I’m going to get to it this summer. Right now, I’m elbow-deep in knitting and sewing my costume, so no reading has been done lately.