WARNING: some bad language and spoilers
Well, it's time to think about novellas. First, one of the great thing about Kindle is that novellas are affordable and can be downloaded without an anthology. I just wish that it was made clear when one is buying a novella. If I'm on the amazon site I usually double-check but on the kindle itself, at 10pm when I'm reading by flashlight....you get it.
Anyway. Coffee Clutch by Marshall Thornton. Wow. Didn't like it. At all. Wouldn't recommend it. Even for .99.
First I object to the title. Please. I hope that the author was trying to be clever, but I get the idea, based on the rest of the novella, that he was just ignorant of the spelling.
One of the amazon reviewers says that she can't point out what she doens't like without spoilers, so HEY, THERE MIGHT BE SPOILERS AFTER THIS POINT.
I don't like the characters. Are ALL men of the sixties truly heinous assholes? Are all of the women ineffectual wimps who just take it? And why are they friends when they don't seem to like each other?
And, the plot. Our main character, a wimpy, sixties housewife who gave up her non-career that she never really tried to get to be a wife and mother decides that her risque, divorced neighbor must have been murdered by her other neighbor. So she sets out to prove this? Not really. She does a bunch of stuff and accidentally finds the killer BUT because she's so wimpy she won't do anything about it because he (the killer) will actually prove that she did it because her husband and ALL of the other husbands in the neighborhood were actually having affairs with the divorcee? Really? And she's not going to confront her husband and she'll continue to live next to the killer.
I get the idea that there will be more in the "next" Jan Birch novel and that she'll "grow" as a person and find herself, blah blah blah. The characters couldn't be more one dimensional. Everything we know is because the author tells us it's so.
The kicker?! There is a movie short with the same name. Based on the novella?! I hope not.
Well, it's time to think about novellas. First, one of the great thing about Kindle is that novellas are affordable and can be downloaded without an anthology. I just wish that it was made clear when one is buying a novella. If I'm on the amazon site I usually double-check but on the kindle itself, at 10pm when I'm reading by flashlight....you get it.
Anyway. Coffee Clutch by Marshall Thornton. Wow. Didn't like it. At all. Wouldn't recommend it. Even for .99.
First I object to the title. Please. I hope that the author was trying to be clever, but I get the idea, based on the rest of the novella, that he was just ignorant of the spelling.
One of the amazon reviewers says that she can't point out what she doens't like without spoilers, so HEY, THERE MIGHT BE SPOILERS AFTER THIS POINT.
I don't like the characters. Are ALL men of the sixties truly heinous assholes? Are all of the women ineffectual wimps who just take it? And why are they friends when they don't seem to like each other?
And, the plot. Our main character, a wimpy, sixties housewife who gave up her non-career that she never really tried to get to be a wife and mother decides that her risque, divorced neighbor must have been murdered by her other neighbor. So she sets out to prove this? Not really. She does a bunch of stuff and accidentally finds the killer BUT because she's so wimpy she won't do anything about it because he (the killer) will actually prove that she did it because her husband and ALL of the other husbands in the neighborhood were actually having affairs with the divorcee? Really? And she's not going to confront her husband and she'll continue to live next to the killer.
I get the idea that there will be more in the "next" Jan Birch novel and that she'll "grow" as a person and find herself, blah blah blah. The characters couldn't be more one dimensional. Everything we know is because the author tells us it's so.
The kicker?! There is a movie short with the same name. Based on the novella?! I hope not.
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