A harsh review got an equally harsh retort this week, not from the author (authors are always told to keep quiet about bad reviews), but a clearly angry man who had helped to propel the novel into the international limelight .
The book is Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North, winner of the 2014 Booker, and the reviewer – poet Michael Hofmann – quoted Oscar Wilde, saying the book about a Japanese prisoner of war camp on the Thailand-Burma railway during World War II would require a “heart of stone to read without laughing”.
He goes on: “You want love, it says; I got love! You want death? I got it. All the kinds. Any amount. It is all bite, and no chew.” He ends his lengthy review with the observation that the novel, based on the experiences of the author’s father, had undergone numerous drafts…
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I just placed this book on my goodreads TBR list & shared it on my review page: https://www.facebook.com/InJoyfulBookReviews
Thank you for posting it.
It’s ironic that a negative review, especially a pompous one will lead me to the book faster than a five star rating.
I suppose that tells about my tendency to support underdog.
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I know, it makes me wonder why this one individual was so far off from the others. @v@ ❤
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