If I've been remiss in replying to the fact that The Onion AV Club this week referred to Jennifer Egan as a "known chick-lit author" it's because every time I start to try to think of a reply worded strongly enough, my brain saves me from having to plumb such depths of my soul by jumping out of my head and strangling itself to death right here next to me on my living room carpet. Seriously, that hurts by the fourth of fifth time.
About as far as I can get each time before brain-death sets in is to say that if you read Look At Me and your thought at the end of the book was "Mmmm...fluffylicious!" then you need to go back and re-read that book because you missed a little something. I mean, you missed all of it. Either that, or you were actually reading a cake. With your tongue.
On the upside, props to Donna Bowman for giving the book an A. I hope this means lots of people get past the total weird backhanded nature of the compliment and they read the book. I also hope that by the time they finish the book they've completely forgotten Bowman's review and they go out and read Look At Me. And then Jennifer Egan will actually be even-more-widely-known as the interesting, challenging writer she is.
(See also: Condalmo, who disliked the review even more than I did.)
3 comments:
Hey, thanks for linking to the review. This was a tough one to write -- I loved the book, but felt that as a hook I needed to acknowledge that those who know Egan's work only casually (i.e., browsing in the bookstore) might think from the design of her covers that she's a woman's author. I checked the text of my review as printed just to be sure -- I did not use the phrase "known chick-lit author." I carefully, carefully said that the pictures of women on the covers of her two previous books could give someone that impression.
Appreciate the chance to set the record straight.
Donna--
The "known chick-lit author" bit comes from the intro statement off the AV Club page ("Can a terrific book by a known chick-lit author escape the genre ghetto? When it's this creepy, it's got a pretty good chance."). I'm guessing this means you didn't write that intro statement?
(The statement is here, for now.)
Once I separate that statement from the text of the review, I see your point much more clearly. And I can definitely see how a casual observer might get the wrong impressions about Ms. Egan's previous works.
Yes, I just went to the front page of the Words section, saw the slug, and cringed. No, I didn't write that. Most of the time the editorial staff who do write those slugs do an excellent job, but it's tough summarizing or hooking the review in a sentence or two -- just as hard as writing a 400 word review of a novel is, I'd wager.
Thanks for looking again.
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