... You fuckin' disappoint me, maybe you're better off this WAY..
Ahh.. Let me start by apologizing to one Skabarella for not including her in as a member of the IPO. The oversight was purely alcohol related.
Well today is another edition of Rhett's literary review. First let me say that I've come under fire for criticizing a best-selling author whilst simultaneously admitting my weakness for shark/dinosaur/large creature books. Folks... if I had been referring to Peter Benchley as an incredibly talented writer when he wrote about a giant squid, or how Steve Alten is completely wronged in being looked over for his work involving prehistoric giant sharks, I could understand the criticism. I have however, never mentioned anything remotely positive of the writing prowess of either of these authors, in fact, if you look at what I said, you'll notice that I've said nothing remotely good about either writer. I said it then, it's entertainment and that's it. As far as criticizing a best-seller author... let me put it this way, who thinks that Keanu Reeves and Ben Affleck are great actors? Very damn few, their movies are big blockbusters though and they seem to be in pretty much everything coming out. The movies are entertaining though.. proving something doesn't have to be technically good to be entertaining. Sorta like what I was saying about shark books and Dan Brown huh? Dan Brown is technically not a great writer, but he is a good storyteller. Still pissed about the helicopter thing though... he held on to a fucking tarp? You want me to believe that a man can simply jump out a helicopter at roughly 30,000ft holding on to a tarp above his head and he won't die? Fuck off.. that's just stupid. It's one thing to ask a lot in believing these works of art are actually keys to a map, but holding a tarp? That's disrespectful. Maybe Brown should have mentioned that the hero also had super-human strength and an adamantium skeleton before he pissed in my ear and told me it was raining.
Ok, enough of that... just to clarify, I did enjoy Angels & Demons and will read The Da Vinci Code but I don't have to think Brown is a great writer. Now I'ma talk about a guy who is a great writer and how this can also work against you. I'm now reading An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears. Yes, you've probably never heard of it, I only picked it up because my honours english (I do have some credentials) prof mentioned it as an example of a very good writer. It was originally published in 1997 and I don't know if it was a best-seller or not, my gut feeling is no. The book is a historical mystery set in 1660 England and Pears sets an impressive scene. The book reads like something written years earlier, very good work with the setting and language. The reason I have a feeling that it wasn't a best-seller, although damn near everything that comes out now is a best-seller, is because this is a book that does not appeal to the unwashed masses. It's the movie that wins best picture that no one sees because it requires, well... too much thought. The Oscars were a great example of it, Chris Rock asking people what the best thing they saw that year was and getting answers like White Chicks and Alien Vs. Predator (that answer given by someone who had obviously only seen one film). When the same people were asked if they'd seen the pictures that were nominated for best picture, no one had. An Instance of the Fingerpost is kinda like this, incredibly well done, but not a plot driven subway book like Angels & Demons. Pears creates a mystery setting of a murder, witnessed by 4 people and then goes on to tell the story from all 4 perspectives one by one. It's brilliantly done, managing to surprise the reader and tie all 4 stories together incredibly well. Whereas I criticized Brown for using a third person omniscient perspective, Pears uses first person perspective. This is usually limiting, but in essentially writing 4 individual accounts of the story, each from a different persons perspective, the book is rounded out better than any third person account could have. An example, we see a horrific scene of medical butchery through the eyes of the shocked Marco da Cola and the sudden shunning he gets from a man who recently was a close friend, then in the next telling, we see the same scene through the eyes of the man who did the butchering and shunning, enabling us to learn his motives and fill out the story better. Very well done, the trade off is this, you can read a plot driven subway book in a day, two at most. The language is simple and there's always something happening that you want to find out next. This is what makes it a great story, not great writing. An Instance of the Fingerpost does not fall into the realm of the subway book, you can't put it down and pick it up anytime and be right back into it. It has more building action, more character development, and far better imagery that requires time and thought. The fact that it is a well written mystery also adds to that, since you never quite know what's going to happen. This makes it not as quickly appealing as the subway book, yet far more gratifying in the end.
