itibaren Coimbra, Portugal
I really enjoy short fiction and post-apocalypse stories. Each story was engaging and fit well with the others as a collection. Still not sure why they gave this one away for free on Kindle . . .
I thought I would really like this novel. I am a huge fan of McMurtry's work, All My Friends are Going to be Strangers. But from the start to end of this novel, I found many aspects of it disturbing and annoying. Every character is unlikable, either because of their actions of adultery, cheating, disloyalty, or because they are happily content in their unmoving relationships and situations. This novel is described as a coming of age story, but really, it just includes many awkward sex scenes, which of course is in every classic coming of age tale, but it got old after a while in this work. Also, the many beautifully written passages that made me fall in love with McMurty in the first place were absent in this entire novel. It read almost like Hemingway in its blunt, short sentences and commonplace adjectives. I haven't seen the movie that was made, inspired by this novel, but I am not sure if I really want to. Who knows, maybe it will be better than the book.