While enjoying pictures from the Flickr “What’s In My Bag” pool (a lovely way to peek into other lives and cultures) I realized that there are many things I don’t carry in my increasingly heavy purse.
Smokes and lighter
Makeup
Camera
Water bottle
Gum
Umbrella
Moisturizer
Hairbrush
Mirror
Almost enough to fill an opposite-me purse!
Second Fiddle to a Steel Guitar. Does what it says on the tin. There are absolutely no surprises in this collection of Nashville performers with a monofilament of plot wrapped around them.
Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, Shell. Non-fiction. As interested as I would like to have been in the history and effects of America’s quest for cheap, I was unable to finish this book. Shell is a correspondent for The Atlantic, and maybe her skills are better suited for shorter pieces. This work was riddled with editing problems on every level, from typos (some of which could have been thinkos) to badly structured paragraphs to an overall lack of narrative cohesion. The book could very likely have been dramatically improved through the services of friend-of-the-Collective Plot to Punctuation.
The difference between the blurbs and the blurb words in context for the book Jack Tumor.
Blurb:
“Lots of laughs.” —Kirkus Reviews
Context:
“Lots of laughs but little else.”
Blurb:
“The love-hate relationship between Hector and his alter ego is engaging.” —School Library Journal
Context:
“The love-hate relationship between Hector and his alter ego is engaging. But, the abundant penis jokes, sex gags, farting, and use of the f-word and other profanities are over-the-top. One tires of distended testicles, pubic lice, anal probes. The message that brain cancer need not mean the end of one’s life and can actually help a teenager stop worrying about his peers is a good one. Too bad the message, Hector’s insightful humor, and his love-hate relationship with Jack are buried in so much vulgarity.”
Blurb:
“McGowan injects plenty of humor.” —Publishers Weekly
Context:
“Though the story can ramble painfully, McGowan injects plenty of humor, phallic references and British slang into this edgy coming-of-age tale.”