Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Tome Tuesday #1 - You Suck: A Love Story

Is there an echo in here?

You may remember reading a few weeks ago that I've decided to throw my hat in the ring and read a book a week for a year as part of the Cannonball Read project at Pajiba... well I neglected to notice that it didn't start until 11/1.

Oh.

So, to answer your unasked question, yes you *have* seen this post before, and yes you're also probably hallucinating too.

Crack is whack!

"You Suck: A Love Story" by Christopher Moore.



I picked this up, admittedly, because the cover and title amused me.

I probably would have enjoyed it more if I'd known this was a sequel to Moore's first vampire novel, "Bloosucking Fiends" and read that first, but somehow I doubt it because it wasn't so much an "I'm lost" dislike that comes from dropping in at the middle as it was a "he phoned it in" feeling.

Our story begins with C. Thomas Flood (Tommy) waking up to find he's been turned into a vampire by his girlfriend Jody.

"You bitch! You killed me! You suck!" says he...

... and wackiness ensues. That's about it.

The whole book just seemed too thrown-together for my taste, less a series of events that relate to each other and more a bunch of episodes of bad judgment and miscommunication tossed at a wall, and those events that stuck made it into the final draft.

My main problem with the whole thing was that just didn't find myself sympathetic to any of the characters. I don't know about you, but that's essential to me being able to have any interest in what's going on. Tommy & Jody just seemed whiny, Jody's "maker" is boring and one-note and more lecherous than evil, and Tommy's n'er-do-well grocery-store employee friends generally just seemed like a pack of assholes with no ability to function as adults and who instead make knee-jerk bad decisions that perhaps a fan of "Jackass" might find hilarious, but which just irritated me. (It's subjective of course - I don't begrudge you enjoying Johnny Knoxville giving himself another concussion, it's just not my cup of tea.)

Plus, there's a blue hooker. Why?

The one exception to me not caring about any of the characters was Abby Normal, a human teen with goth tendencies and a dirty mouth. Her diary entries throughout are hysterical, typical "OMG" teen-talk peppered with the purple prose I remember so well from my very own black-clad youth - even there, though, the schtick is used so often here that it gets tiresome after awhile.

This one's getting donated to the library - someone else might enjoy it, but it wasn't my favorite. Give it a shot if you've read "Bloodsucking Fiends", but if not...

Pass.

Since I usually like Christopher Moore (a good recommendation: "Practical Demon Keeping") I wondered if it was just me, but a quick perusal of the Amazon reviews seems to support the theory that this wasn't his best work... then again lots of people loved it, so who am I to say? I'm no critic.

Happy Tuesday!

6 comments:

Dandy said...

I don't think I have read anything by Christopher Moore. I'm not sure why not. But to be honest I haven't picked up a book in months and months. I have 7 books on my nightstand. I've started 3 and not finished which is totally unlike me.

curegirl0421 said...

Well yeah what with all the wedding stuff, I'm not surprised! The nice thing about books is they'll be waiting for you when you're ready to pick them back up. No TiVo required, no expiration dates.

Julie said...

Mmmm, Kindle...

Dandy said...

Crack is whack!

Dandy said...

How cute is that mushroom ornament!!

curegirl0421 said...

I know! :) I'm trying to come up with a good ornament for the swap... I love swaps, you get to make stuff for people AND you get packages of goodies in the mail.

Win Win.