Just a little warning that this is a SPOILER REVIEW!
If you think there is any remote possibility that you will ever, at any point in your life, read this book, please stop reading IMMEDIATELY!
There. Now I don’t have to feel guilty. You’ve been adequately warned.
Let me just start by saying that this was my first exposure to Glenn Beck. I’m not even really sure what I’ve heard about him, except that he seems to appeal, on purpose, to LDS audiences. I got the book for Christmas and thought it looked like something I might actually make it to the end of, so I read it.
First of all, there are about 500 blurbs all over the book that tell you what it’s going to be about. Eddie wants a bike for Christmas. Eddie gets an ugly sweater instead. Eddie is mad and his life is somehow changed forever. So, the fact that I was told this scenario 500 times before I started reading made the first….oh, about 50 pages really boring. It wasn’t until after he got the sweater that I actually became somewhat interested in what happens next.
Second observation: Glenn Beck’s writing style is really repetitive. There is a flashback on every page. No, that’s not an exaggeration. Granted, he’s trying to tell a story by describing what Eddie’s life was like before THE CHRISTMAS SWEATER. But, I’m pretty sure that a mark of a good writer (which I do not claim to be) is to vary the style or at least write in a way that is not a distraction. I was distracted many times by the constant flashbacks.
Then there was the resolution.
Excuse me while I flashback here for a minute. Any time I start to read a book, my husband, Weston, finds it and reads it all the way through before I do. He read this one in about an hour.
When I got about three-fourths of the way through I started to wonder how this story was possibly going to resolve in any satisfying way. I don’t like sad endings. Neither, I suppose, does Glenn Beck’s audience at large. I wondered out loud to Weston:
“How is he going to resolve this?”
This was followed by my husband trying to tell me that Eddie gets involved with drugs. And he reiterated the fact that the book is intended to be something of an autobiography, and Mr. Beck was apparently involved with drugs. I didn’t believe him. And he was totally lying, anyway.
Then I said, with sarcasm oozing out of every breath:
“I suppose he’ll get to the end and wake up and realize it was all just a bad dream.”
Silence from Weston. But he gave me enough of an unassuming smile that he didn’t give away the fact that I was right.
I WAS RIGHT!!!!
I was totally kidding. To me, that is the archetypical cop-out ending. You just DON’T write a story and have it resolve with the main character waking up from a bad dream. You just don’t.
Well, I guess it’s not so bad when you read the epilogue and realize that the entire book was written for the purpose of Mr. Beck trying to find another outlet to describe a vivid dream he once had.
Still…..anyone want a copy of The Christmas Sweater?
2 comments:
That's too bad. I thought his prior book was kind of funny but I'm not a big fan of sentimental stories. And I don't read a lot of books (until they come to video). Thanks for the heads up so I will know to avoid it.
PS-I agree with "and then he woke up" as being the ultimate copout for a story.
Hey, Emily, don't kid yourself about not being a good writer...I'd much rather read your blog than Beck's. I got that book for Christmas, too, but since I don't really get Beck's appeal, I haven't even cracked it open yet, so my copy is also up for grabs.
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