Today’s entry will feature reviews of various things that suck, and some that don’t. If you’re more interested in my personal life than my opinions, I’ve put up a bunch of new photos on my Flickr site. Mostly of chickens and flowers.
Review number the first: Jodi Picoult. I read an article in the Times culture supplement (i.e. a fairly respectable journalistic publication) about Jodi Picoult claiming that despite her ‘Oprah’s Book Club’ sort of aura, she writes very gripping, imaginative, emotionally realistic first-person accounts of highly fraught subject matter. It did say that her writing dips into cliché at times, but that overall her lack of kudos from the literary establishment types was somewhat unfair. This all sounded very interesting, so I picked up a copy of Harvesting the Heart second-hand on Amazon.
And…hmm. To be fair, maybe the author of that article was reading some of Picoult’s other books, ones that perhaps don’t completely fucking suck. Because there are no two ways about it: Harvesting the Heart completely fucking sucks. I’ve managed to get nearly halfway through (only because I’ve got an Iris Murdoch and a Martin Amis novel waiting and I won’t let myself start them until I finish this crap), and so far Ms Picoult has managed to trundle out nearly every cliché in the bad novel arsenal. Clumsy descriptive writing, with too many adjectives in every sentence? Check. Unrealistic plot devices? Check. Ham-fisted symbolism – for instance, a young mother staring pensively at animals in a zoo, because like them she too feels trapped? Check. Ye gods. She’s even included a few of those women’s-novel sex scenes, where everyone’s anatomy is hazily described, and the man generally leaves a ‘burning trail of kisses’ on the heroine’s tender flesh and gazes into her eyes as he vaguely sort of ‘enters’ her, and then there’s some abstract thrusting of some sort, and then without any further ado they both have an earth-shattering orgasm, except not in so many words – more like they ‘ride the crest of their shuddering waves of pleasure’ or something. (I call these Magic Dick sex scenes.) And then the woman realises through the intensity of their lovemaking that theirs are truly twin souls. In other words, barf. Not only is this terrible, terrible, lazy writing, but it perpetuates the myth of the vaginal orgasm. Get thee behind me, Jodi Picoult!
Review the second: The Da Vinci Code. We recorded this off Sky Box Office in a moment of desperation. I knew it wouldn’t be good, but I didn’t realise it would be so incredibly irritating. I’ve never read the book (surprise!), but I’ve heard it defended on the grounds that even if it’s not good literature as such, it does make people aware of things like the Council of Nicea, the Gnostic gospels, and so forth. Well…OK, maybe so, but for every ounce of historical truth, there’s a pound of complete and utter crap. Jesus’ divinity was never argued at the Council of Nicea. Constantine was not a devoted lifelong pagan. And “the pagans” (all several hundred discrete cultures of them) certainly never worshipped a single goddess. This is one of those books that actually manages to make people stupider than they already are. Seriously, there’s more sound metaphysical thought in a Harry Potter book.
As for the movie, it was pretty much a first-year university lecture punctuated by car chases. Ian McKellen’s character even had a slide show conveniently prepared. And was it just me, or was everyone talking like they’d been hypnotised? BORING.
And now for something that doesn’t completely suck: Die Hard. Duuuuuuude. I can’t believe I never saw it until this weekend. Fucking brilliant. Alan Rickman? Brilliant! The horde of slab-like Arians in turtlenecks? Brilliant! The one-liners? So brilliant! And Paul Gleason? Oh, Paul Gleason. Nobody was ever a better schmuck than you. His delivery of the line, “We’re going to need some more FBI guys, I guess” (after the helicopter containing the two senior FBI agents is consumed in an enormous fireball) made the fucking movie. Rest in peace, Mr Gleason.