The CORRECTIONS

A thoroughly unpleasant
book. Look: the themes are
well-done, the characters well
-drawn and the story, well, long,
but I didn't enjoy it for all it was
well-written. There's an elderly
mom and dad

and their three adult children, all
steeped in various betrayals, especially
self-betrayals. None of them like each
other very much; maybe the sister and
one of the brothers have an alliance. The

kids
are all
busy ruining their
own lives. The father and mother are trying
to deal with the father's rather rapid slide
into dementia. A lot of flashbacks
lay out the various stories, an
interleaved history
of resentments and
disappointed hopes.
It all comes to a head
at a family Christmas
get-together.

Sound like one of yours? By all means, 
go f*** yourself with a broom handle 
then, and complain about how your meds 
made you do it. Trauma is self-ownership 
palmed off on circumstance in a very short
to midrange con with all the trimmings missing,
and nobody wants to find the consequence or even

take one guess 

as to its potential lessons. Great read, 
Oprah. Slap a medal on it and tell 
Franzen to get going on the team 
superhero book he so assiduously 
avoids jumping into, tights 

bunched to the front and all askew!

Mind you, the hype
and the praise this book
received in hugely unequal parts are
not overblown. It's a solid piece of work, excruciatingly
so vivid in parts - especially the father's pathetic
disintegration on a cruise ship

as he tries furiously to hold himself
together by dint of the sheer accumulated
rectitude of a lifetime, and utterly
unhilariously
fails, betrayed
by his failing brain, heart, body
and mind plus a dodgy experimental
drug called Aslan.

Look. The book is clearly meant
to be unpleasant. See? SEE! It's
definitely a masterful piece of

craft.

I can't knock it from an artistic
standpoint, but I wasn't able to get
good out of it no matter how hard 
I pounded it home. No, I've enjoyed
some very unpleasant books before,

but this one's got me beat.

No fourth star. Sorry.