Arbieroo reviewed The Fifth Heart by Dan Simmons
Review of 'The Fifth Heart' on 'Goodreads'
2 stars
What should have been spectacular (Sherlock Holmes meets up with Henry James to solve a murder mystery that has international repercussions, whilst doubting his own existence) disappoints on all fronts.
The usual flaws (excessive wodges of unnecessary research detail and thinly disguised lit.crit. essays) are all present and still wrong and here they drown a short, exciting novel until it's dead beyond recovery. Additionally, the whole, "is Holmes real?" scenario reads like the author read Redshirts and thought, I can do a more literary job than that! but failed to actually have anything profound or interesting to say about it.
Dan, remember when your books weren't pretentious, overly long and largely boring? I do. Can we have more of those, please? If you want to write history, write history; if you want to write biography, write biography; if you want to write lit.crit. write lit.crit; if you want to write …
What should have been spectacular (Sherlock Holmes meets up with Henry James to solve a murder mystery that has international repercussions, whilst doubting his own existence) disappoints on all fronts.
The usual flaws (excessive wodges of unnecessary research detail and thinly disguised lit.crit. essays) are all present and still wrong and here they drown a short, exciting novel until it's dead beyond recovery. Additionally, the whole, "is Holmes real?" scenario reads like the author read Redshirts and thought, I can do a more literary job than that! but failed to actually have anything profound or interesting to say about it.
Dan, remember when your books weren't pretentious, overly long and largely boring? I do. Can we have more of those, please? If you want to write history, write history; if you want to write biography, write biography; if you want to write lit.crit. write lit.crit; if you want to write novels, write novels!