A Technological Breakthrough!
by St. Clair Carr, literary editor, NEW IMPROVED HEAD
NEW IMPROVED HEAD is proud to announce that with its new advanced book review compression technology it can now offer you book reviews which, believe it or not, are even more information-packed than previous reviews on this site! For example, we estimate that the article you're reading now contains about 20 to 40 times the information of the typical book review in the Toronto Globe and Mail! And it's closer to 40 times!
We decided to try out our new technology with current books, for a change. Like our colleague E. N. Beej, we find rummaging through the old books at used bookstores to be both more pleasant and more profitable than looking through the current books at one of the big box bookstores, but since most people seem to believe the exact opposite we decided it was time again to do some reviews for them.
As we have mentioned, sort of, in an earlier article, we here in the literary department believe that you can usually decide whether a book is worth buying by reading no more than the first couple paragraphs. And when you base a review on only the first two paragraphs you can just cram your article full of helpful criticism!
So we went to a couple of chain bookstores and had a look at the first two paragraphs of the featured books there. These books were not all recent publications, but those that weren't were prizewinners or recent, and much ballyhooed, Oprah selections. So hold on to your hats as we head off on our whirlwind tour of the current literary scene!
Peter Carey, The True Story of the Kelly Gang (Booker Prize winner): If buddy wants us to pay $21 Cdn. for his book, buddy can bloody well punctuate it. There isn't a comma in the entire thing.
Anna Quindlen, A Short Guide to a Happy Life (Oprah): The first sentence of this opuscule is "I am not particularly qualified by profession or education to give advice and counsel." Hey, Anna – did it ever occur to you that maybe that was why you could only manage to write 19 (nineteen) small pages of copy about your topic? Did it ever occur to you that maybe being unqualified to write a book is not the best qualification for writing it? Anyway, Ms Quindlen gives us all of 19 tiny pages (each probably contains fewer than a hundred words) for $19.95 Cdn. For $1.05 a page I expect a handwritten copy. And Anna Quindlen to read it to me.
Ann-Marie McDonald, Fall on Your Knees (Oprah): The first paragraph of this novel contains 11 sentences. Of those 11, 7 are actually sentence fragments. Too twee for me.
Deepak Chopra, Grow Younger, Live Longer: Buddy starts out by saying that most people's problem is they never grow up. Sort of contradicts his title, don't it?
Douglas Coupland, All Families are Psychotic: Mr. Coupland's previous work had not prepared us to believe that we would be impressed by this novel, but in fact it opens good, like a novel should. The opening paragraphs are tightly and strikingly written and engaged our interest. Rather than pay $34.95 Cdn., though, I think I'll wait till copies start to show up in the used bookstore. After all, for $34.95 I could buy a couple of Jackie McLean CDs.
Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance (Oprah): If you want to describe a train as bloated (I don't know why you would, but it's a free country), then you have to restrain yourself from going on to describe the mass of people bloating it as a soap bubble. Soap bubbles don't bloat, they float. Even I know that.
Nancy Huston. Dolce Agonia: The opening paragraphs are supposed to have been written by God, no less. Perhaps they were. If they indeed were, God seems to be a little slow on the uptake. Of course, that would explain why his Creation is such a load of cobblers.
David Adams Richards, Mercy Among the Children: Another competently written and engaging pair of opening paragraphs, although they are leave you wondering, as you wonder about many Canadian books, if the book will ever get to where it seems to be headed.
Margaret Somerville, The Ethical Canary: This book starts with a thrilling anecdote about Dr. Somerville's experiences delivering a lecture called "Health Care Systems at the Crossroads: Balancing Individual Needs with (sic) Financial Limitations." Could she keep up the pace? I didn't wait to find out.
So there you are: nine reviews in the space of one! Not only that, you've learned a valuable critical technique which you can use on your next visit to the big box bookstore! You'll easily be able to work your way through five books in the time it used to take you to consider one! With practice you'll be able to work your way through many more! The extra time you save in the bookstore you can apply to profitable pursuits such as managing your investments! Wow! Is your life ever going to get better, and it's all thanks to NEW IMPROVED HEAD!!
Books reviewed may not be typical. Critical statements refer to the first two paragraphs only. Critical principles described do not apply to technical works. American and other foreign editions may come differently equipped.A Technological Breakthrough! © Coolth, 2002
Click the banner or click here for ACTUAL ANALYSIS
Reviews | Home