Spike ,'Conversations with Dead People'
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
It was prententious and annoying (second only to the beginning of A Heartbreaking Work... ).
Good god, ick. I wanted to like it, and I think he has talent, and had a story to tell, but jesus. It was like watching some guy masturbate for seven thousand pages.
I also loved A Heartbreaking Work..., so YPMV, I guess. Or at least, YTOP.
I loved both those books, but I really had to get over the style of both in the early pages.
I don't want some elaborate "found manuscript" set-up or cutesy narrative element. Just tell the story dammit.
The actual text in Eggers's book was good, but the author's notes and appendices and blah blah blah BLAH really made my teeth itch.
You know what book is awesome? Room! Has anyone else read it?
I want to but my library doesn't seem to have it.
I don't want some elaborate "found manuscript" set-up or cutesy narrative element. Just tell the story dammit.
So not a House of Leaves fan either? (Personally, I heart narrative conceits.)
The actual text in Eggers's book was good, but the author's notes and appendices and blah blah blah BLAH really made my teeth itch.
Whereas I loved them and found them hilarious. I tend to enjoy metanarrative, though, although sometimes it can be annoying, I agree.
I love House of Leaves and hated A Heartbreaking Work... so much so that I haven't finished reading it. Eggers just annoyed the crap out of me; it wasn't the narrative conceit per se, more that I just wanted to slap him.
I love it when the author calls me, "reader".
I couldn't read Heartbreaking Work (bounced hard off the first 30 pages), but I really loved The Book Thief. That said, I suspect Zukas could have done more with the conceit.
Megan, I know I'm a little late, but I recommend Marc Reisner's Cadillac Desert or The Most Dangerous Place for California Dreaming. I have often suggested that the state should give copies of CD to new arrivals as they cross the border.