For the past five years I've finished every book I've started.
Even books I don't like I finish because I want to know what makes a
book succeed and what makes a book fail. For me it's a study in the
craft and I seek out what other people enjoy, what they see in the
literature they read. This book, Saturday by Ian McEwan, broke that
streak. I couldn't finish it. I couldn't push myself through to the
end.
It's a novel that tries too hard to wrap itself in the trappings of theme and symbolism that it forgot one important element – plot. Every moment of Henry Perowne's day is described in painful detail. Every decision, every point of a squash game, every item on the shopping list. Grueling – that's the word that I'd use to describe it.
Sometimes I've heard people say that their favorite author could write a shopping list that'd be interesting. It's just a saying people, it isn't true. In fact there's a lot of stuff that people write for their own notes that the public ought not be subjected to . . . like character study notes. Maybe Henry Perowne should've been an interesting character in a book with a plot. Maybe he'd have been sympathetic in such a vehicle.
This was not that vehicle. This isn't even a novel. It's just a long drawn-out, boring, tedious vignette. Characterization notes. Nothing more.
- CV Rick, May 2008
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