Review: Barely readable
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 08 20, 2011
Frankly, I'm stunned by the rave reviews for this one.  I was ready to put it down in disgust at the bad writing style (despite really wanting to read about her experience in the WTC), but decided that since it was a quick read I'd put up with it and see if it got any better.  It didn't.  And I have to say I didn't like her character much either.  Early in the book she's almost blase about her negative traits, and I hoped that the end of the book would show a realisation of them and solid effort to become a better person, but the absence of any description of such growth leads the reader to think that her honesty is more due to not seeing anything wrong with the traits than having seen and improved.I did find the bible quotes overdone and oftentimes ill-placed, but that was only a minor gripe compared to the other negatives.  Some examples:Her character:1) She was a manipulative boss: "I took mental note of those working and those pretending to work in order that I might later make someone's day with a big project that afforded them no time for pretense."2) She was a control freak and selfish: "[Questioning her assistant] was to appease my need to be in control and to get an explanation simple enough so as not to complicate my breakfast."3) She had a simplistic and exclusionary faith: "the Negro spirituals that flow from the mouths of these dirty-blond men [homeless men busking in the subway] embarrass me."  (Note: Negro spirituals were coded escape messages for slaves in southern America; to be embarrassed by disempowered people singing them shows failure to understand the songs' purposes and to see below the socially-unacceptable surface of those people.)4) She can't find much positive about herself: "He [her son] is the only good thing I have ever done, and unlike most teenagers, I like him."Her writing style:1) Describing her mother at the piano: "Her hands glided effortlessly, tickling the ivories, with her eyes closed and head tossed back."2) At the point where she's out of the building, and describing how she started back towards it instead of getting further away, she gives a bible quote and then suddenly breaks off to describe how she was raped at 15 years old.  Yes, she builds a tenuous connection - after another page of description - but it's poorly placed, as are many other interspersions including later journal entries.3) "With blatant dull thuds and pops of exploding flesh, persons once known as, became another of the unknown bodies twisted in midair and liberated from business attire" - and no, I haven't omitted any words from the quote!4) "Had I even a vague idea of the enormity of what was still to come [this was before the towers came down], I probably would have saved the tears for weeping and gnashing of teeth."5) "By now I was so removed that I couldn't even cry.  Instead my mind made art of it all.  I chose to go even further down that rabbit hole."  (This is the first and only use of the phrase "rabbit hole" and it is given no context.)The book gets a *reluctant* second star due to the interest factor of her experience, but it's only that which moves the rating from "I hate it" to "I don't like it".  It's the first book I've thought was bad enough to actually delete from my kindle.