I always feel guilty when I enjoy a snarky review of a book, especially of fiction. I know how hard it is to write, so I rarely say much about books I don\u2019t like, unless they\u2019re the kind of book I want to throw across the room.<\/p>\n
But sometimes a snarky review not only tells me I wouldn\u2019t want to read a book, but also tells me why. And that saves me money and time and keeps me from throwing things.<\/p>\n
Ron Charles \u2013 who reviewed for The Washington Post<\/i> for many years and now has a newsletter<\/a> \u2013 did just that in his recent review of Matthew Aldrich\u2019s book, The Natural Order<\/i><\/a>.<\/p>\n There are several delightful lines in this review, but it was this observation that really sucked me in:<\/p>\n [The main character\u2019s] stew of self-aggrandizement, self-pity, and self-delusion requires a degree of irony that\u2019s missing here because, like Fitzgerald, Aldrich is caught between satirizing the rich and idolizing them. But unlike Fitzgerald, he does not write like Fitzgerald.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Now you should understand that I think The Great Gatsby<\/i> is terribly overrated. I\u2019ve read it a couple of times, but while I agree that Fitzgerald had a lovely way with words, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s the great American novel.<\/p>\n In those two sentence, Charles encapsulates in a nutshell what\u2019s wrong with The Great Gatsby<\/i> as well as what\u2019s wrong with the book he\u2019s reviewing. You can only get away with that angsty idolization of the rich if you can write like Fitzgerald. And in my opinion, even Fitzgerald shouldn\u2019t be allowed to get away with it.<\/p>\n But of course, by doing so, Charles is damning Aldrich\u2019s book, which is a first novel. That seems a bit unfair, but since Aldrich is also a screenwriter and sold the screen rights to this book before it even came out, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to make a lot of difference in his life. He obviously will make more money from the movie than the book in any case. <\/p>\n The book is about a broligarch type who has figured out how to live forever, or at least longer than anyone else, and is about to release his official method (for more big bucks). It\u2019s set in 2070, so it\u2019s obviously near future science fiction, but called a thriller because it isn\u2019t published as SF or written by a science fiction writer.<\/p>\n Since I have followed the antics of such people as Bryan Johnson (clearly the model for the main character) and read Adam Becker\u2019s More Everything Forever<\/i> and Gil Duran\u2019s The Nerd Reich<\/i>, I am not interested in a book that treats such a person sympathetically.<\/p>\n Given how much clout the broligarchs have in our society, we are in need of science fiction that makes clear the harm that they\u2019re doing and undermines their projects with ideas on how to build a sustainable future rather than ones built on the wet dreams of people with too much money and an inability to comprehend science fiction.<\/p>\n And by comparison, the trouble with The Great Gatsby<\/i> is that it is far too sympathetic to a grifter not unlike the one currently occupying our White House. Yes, it also treats the established rich with accurate contempt, but replacing them with the likes of Jay Gatsby or Donald Trump is far from a solution.<\/p>\n Even in 1925 \u2013 and especially in 2026 \u2013 we need books that undermine the American urge for extreme wealth instead of ones that view it with longing.<\/p>\n Actually, the lines I quote earlier weren\u2019t the snarkiest ones in this review. Charles started it by saying, \u201cI started reading Matthew Aldrich\u2019s The Natural Order<\/i> just a few hours after I got a colonoscopy. In the end, the novel was better.\u201d<\/p>\n Ouch. That was rude. I didn\u2019t quite approve, but I obviously kept reading. I mean, I\u2019ve had colonoscopies and I\u2019ve read books that aren\u2019t a much better experience myself.<\/p>\n Not all of Charles\u2019s reviews are snarky. He does really like books. Since the Post <\/i>has killed its book section, like so many other publications, subscribing to his newsletter is a good way to keep up with new books you might not find elsewhere, especially if you, like me, aren\u2019t entranced by algorithm-generated recommendations and Goodreads reviews.<\/p>\n By the way, I don\u2019t really believe in the idea of the Great American Novel. It was born of the competitive urges of male writers in the first half of the 20th century.<\/p>\n But if you have to have one, the obvious choice is Toni Morrison\u2019s Beloved<\/i>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I always feel guilty when I enjoy a snarky review of a book, especially of fiction. I know how hard it is to write, so I rarely say much about books I don\u2019t like, unless they\u2019re the kind of book I want to throw across the room. But sometimes a snarky review not only tells […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[335,6,10],"tags":[1261],"class_list":["post-4948","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books-2","category-fiction","category-reviews","tag-ron-charles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4948"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4949,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4948\/revisions\/4949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4948"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4948"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/treehousewriters.com\/wp53\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4948"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}