Two Books Not Worth It
So, I get a couple of books a while back: Inferno by Todd Riemer and Extinction – The Ultimate Holocaust by Dan Ailey. And honestly, I had every intention of reading these books. Seriously, I mean it.
But I just can’t work up the interest. But I feel obligated to say something about them, so here we go:
Inferno is about a guy who escapes prison to search for his dead girlfriend. I think. I got to page 24 and had to put it down. Because it was moving slow, and because author Todd Riemer does not know how to use quotation marks. No, scratch that – he doesn’t use them at all. Entire conversations take place with no proper punctuation, and I just couldn’t muster up the energy to work that hard. Thanks, Mr. Riemer, but you need to go back to English class.
When you get angry at the author over something like mechanics, story really doesn’t matter one iota.
Extinction‘s full title appears to be Extinction – The Ultimate Holocaust: The Plan to Exterminate Humanity. Now, with a title like that, you’d think it was some epic apocalyptic story about the survival of humanity against the ultimate Very Bad Day. Dan Ailey is a retired university professor, and this is his first novel. According to the bio on the back, he has “an abiding interest in environmental issues”. OK. There’s a reason why they say “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.” Ailey’s first mistake is giving this book such a highfalutin’ title so as to raise expectations. Second mistake was to tell the entire story in the five-page “Prologue”. No, really. Ailey tells the whole story before he tells the story.
Failing grade, Professor.
OK, that’s it. Thanks for playing.