(no subject)
just finished reading "gods behaving badly," a novel by marie phillips. i picked it up a few weeks ago at borders, when their mini-store in vancouver mall was closing so everything was 40% off. the idea of it intrigued me, greek gods living together in a flat in modern-day london, so i picked it up and only this weekend found the time to read it.
overall, it was a decent read; the plot was interesting and a good idea. however, i will say the rest of it kind of blew. some sentences were awkwardly broken apart: "'Your presence," he said, "is critical." Most of the time it seemed as though the author was going for dramatic dialogue, but because it occurred so often it was just plain awkward. and speaking of often, "façade" must be one of phillips' favorite words, because i can't count how many times she used it. finally, during the climax of the novel, a feeble attempt at suspense became nothing beyond annoying. constantly characters were asking others "what's going on? what are you going to do? what are you up to? how can we do this?" only followed by "trust me" and "wait and see." it made the novel sound like a script for a film, where the finale is painfully obvious and secrets are sprawled across the pages rather than cleverly hidden in the text for the reader to slowly uncover. i was able to guess the ending with plenty of time to spare, and i doubt anyone else would have much trouble doing the same.
i realize i probably sound like i'm really bashing this book, but i feel like as long as you can get past some of the cringe-worthy aspects, you could really enjoy it. the plot is probably the only reason why i kept reading, though the whole time i was thinking about how the material had so much more potential. overall, mediocre.
overall, it was a decent read; the plot was interesting and a good idea. however, i will say the rest of it kind of blew. some sentences were awkwardly broken apart: "'Your presence," he said, "is critical." Most of the time it seemed as though the author was going for dramatic dialogue, but because it occurred so often it was just plain awkward. and speaking of often, "façade" must be one of phillips' favorite words, because i can't count how many times she used it. finally, during the climax of the novel, a feeble attempt at suspense became nothing beyond annoying. constantly characters were asking others "what's going on? what are you going to do? what are you up to? how can we do this?" only followed by "trust me" and "wait and see." it made the novel sound like a script for a film, where the finale is painfully obvious and secrets are sprawled across the pages rather than cleverly hidden in the text for the reader to slowly uncover. i was able to guess the ending with plenty of time to spare, and i doubt anyone else would have much trouble doing the same.
i realize i probably sound like i'm really bashing this book, but i feel like as long as you can get past some of the cringe-worthy aspects, you could really enjoy it. the plot is probably the only reason why i kept reading, though the whole time i was thinking about how the material had so much more potential. overall, mediocre.