Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Bloggy Book Club Meetup!!!!! Between the Bridge and the River

Oh, so late! Forgive me. What started out as a few mercy delays, for everyone to finish up reading turned into me catching the nastiest flu in the history of ever and having to delay the meetup and review even longer. On the plus side, I hope those who wouldn't have otherwise been able to finish the book were able to finish the book!

So to the review!

One of the things I love the most about this novel is the novelty of seeing America through a foreignor's eyes. Mr. Craig Ferguson since the writing of the novel has become an American citizen and is currently in that new-American state of patriotic fervor that makes me a natural born American feel a bit unappreciative of my homeland. What amuses me very much is the way he takes a good hard look at some of the strangest things about America and Americans, and he doesn't come down acidly and condescending upon it, but instead, he sees something unique and worthwhile about it.

His characters all fascinate me. They are so horribly flawed, and there is a fussy selfishness about a few of them at the least, and a horrifying decay about the worst of them. He doesn't shy away from anything about them.

Did anyone have a favorite character or storyline? Was there a storyline or character who couldn't be stomached? Seeing as Mr. Ferguson is a highschool dropout who has pretty much completed his education by filling in his knowledge gaps by sitting in a library or experiencing things himself, how did his writing style and story structure seem to you? (I kind of root for him there because I am also a school dropout who feverishly tries to compensate for my gaps in knowledge by learning about anything I can on my own.) Was there a storyline that just busted reality a bit tooo much for you or did you find yourself just going along with it. (Believe me, in some parts of America, church chanting and snake twirling is alive and well. Heh.)

Well, I hope everyone had fun and I can't wait to read comments!

How did everyone's holidays go? :D