The Gargoyle’s “positive” reviews
Both the Winnipeg Free Press and the Vancouver Sun ran stories this week claiming that the early reviews of Andrew Davidson’s uber-hyped The Gargoyle are mostly raves, but did they really read those reviews? From our perspective, the reviews are conflicted at best, and give a distinct sense of punches being pulled.
For instance, Janet Maslin’s review in the New York Times, which functions as ‘Exhibit A’ for both the Free Press and the Sun, never actually says the book is any good. In fact, Maslin seems to be trying to let Davidson hang himself with his own rope, by quoting a lot of very florid-seeming prose at length. And she ends the review by summing up the book thus:
Lessons are learned, love is found, spirits are restored, and faith is revealed, all in the overheated cauldron of Mr. Davidson’s imagination.
And though Ron Charles of The Washington Post writes what amounts to a positive review, he constantly employs the kind of hedge-yer-bets phrases – “an undeniably hot book” – that critics use when they don’t want to deride a likely bestseller too harshly.
Meanwhile, in one openly negative critique, Lev Grossman from Time compares the book unfavorably to The English Patient (he wonders why it wasn’t simply titled The American Patient) and throws up his hands in disgust after trying to summarize the story:
I would very much like to stop summarizing the plot now. Instead, here is a quote from their inevitable love affair: “A cheese strand dangled from her mouth to the edge of her left nipple, and I wanted to rappel it like a mozzarella commando to storm her lovely breasts.” Nurse, is it time for my shot?
I will never understand the people who make decisions in this industry. Great small-press books are published straight into oblivion while mozzarella commandos get million-dollar advances.
I’ll go on the record — I thought it was a fantastic book. And while out of context the mozzarella commando line looks ridiculous, it’s part and parcel of the narrator’s voice and personality.
Thanks Rob, I was thinking similarly.
One must remember that it is the “voice” of the narrator, the protagonist that we are hearing. Do we expect everything he says to sound like that of a learned english professsor? This may sound like a cop out, but taken in context it is something the narrator might say. Would Davidson himself say it? Who knows. If you read some of the interviews he has given he seems extremely well spoken.
I have trouble with some of the prose too, but taking the book as a whole, it was one that I could not put down.
Hmmm . . .
“BJ” = Random House employee?
Rob,
Gotta disagree with you on that quote: bad writing is bad writing is bad writing, and that is one of the worst passages I have ever read (unless it’s a successful parody of bad writing). I get tired of being told that I’m supposed to like the Ondaatjes of this world by people who admit that the prose is the literary equivalent to lumpy treacle.
You’ll notice that I didn’t actually say anything about the quality of the writing, right? That line, though, is characteristic of the narrator’s voice — colloquial, overblown, awkwardly sexual.
That last bit with the cheese sounds like Wallace and Gromit’s next adventure. Of course, it would have to be Wendsleydale hanging out of her mouth.
I love the review from Entertainment Weekly, which was not mixed, but included the classic line:
“This much-hyped book is eye-bulgingly atrocious, packed with medieval history to disguise prose that’s worse than your average Dungeons & Dragons blog.”
Ouch!!
I’m with you, Friday, the Entertainment Weekly review really said it all for me! (At least in terms of having a clear and vehement response, regardless of how many critique-blinding bucks were shelled out for the ms.)
Ooops, sorry I meant Frida!
I really just wish the various publicity machines — oops, I mean ‘reviewers’ — would offer up straight forward accounts: this is a lyrically fatuous novel, built around a predictable allegory, whose Gothic elements and florid detail will greatly appease Buffy fans the world over. No problems with that.
I loved the book. I’m pretty sure that anyone who reads it will either love it or hate it. There really isn’t a middle ground. This book is a doorway into some weird human experiences–addiction, prostitution, mutilation, art, love–and resonates with one of the most universal aspects of being human–the desire to love and be loved.
It annoys me that most of the reviews simply describe the plot and miss the essence–redemption. The value of a meaningful life. This book is a moral fable for the 21 st century.
A literary masterpiece? Probably not. But definitely an interesting read that may move a few cynics (and really annoy the rest). I’m recommending it.