For the past 9 months I've been picking this book up, trying to read it (or figure out what the premise is, or asking myself what it's all about, etc., etc.), and it's just not singing out "finish me, finish me." In fact, each time I've tried reading it, the other side of my brain is going "why are you wasting your time.? I'm not liking this...."
I'm sure Shakespeare buffs are falling on their swords right now, but sorry, this one is going onto the abandoned pile--since it's a clearly marked NOT FOR SALE ARC, I can't even donate it to the library for its annual book sale. If you are interested in more objective assessments, BOOKLIST and Publisher's Weekly have blurbs you can read here.
Now...
At this point, I began paging through to see how far I really got, and my brain clicked on again. "This book is downright funny" I thought. "Some of this is finally making sense. I think I understand what the author is trying to do here"...So I planned to finish it over the weekend, and then give you the final review. In the meantime, I thought it would be worthwhile to admit that sometimes it takes a time or two for something to 'click' and we ought not be too hasty to toss something aside. I was really settling back, and actually got about 95 of the 320 pages done, but realized that while there are sections of this book that are genuinely funny, and the premise is terribly clever, I just cannot take the abundance of sex, more sex, drugs, and more drugs needed to tell the story the way the author presents it. It is hereby permanently consigned to the abandoned forever pile. Sorry Will, but this book is not for me.
I appreciate the opportunity offered to review the book, and will point out that no body can read every book and have a favorable opinion. Others, including some very well known authors, have rated it highly. If you're a Shakespeare fan, a humor fan, and like satire, you might want to give it a try.
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I had a book swap at my house this past weekend and one of my neighbors (and fellow book club members) brought this one. She said she had abandoned it because of the abundance of sex and drugs in it as well. I snagged it anyway and will see how I get on with it eventually.
ReplyDeleteKristen....I look forward to another opinion.
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