Reviews for An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England

The average rating for An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England based on 2 reviews is 1.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2007-09-11 00:00:00 Graham Patrick I really wanted to love this book. I couldn't tell you why, but I wanted this one to be a triumph. But, considering it took countless small bursts of very reluctant reading over the course of the entire fall to get through it, I have to classify this one as a total bust. Even more disappointing still is that I don't even have a great reason other than to say that it was just bad! The first and foremost problem here is that the narrator is a total disaster. Sam is a convicted arsonist who, through some stroke of luck, has managed to create a decent life for himself prior to the start of the book. Before the first five pages are up, you can tell that Sam is whining, snively, spineless, and very much a bore. But, something happens, and as the book progresses and he lets his world spin out of control, it comes to the point where you realize that if you didn't care so little about his life (and the book), you'd want to punch him. The plot is also implausible - full of stock characters whose predictable actions drive the story to an ending you definitely could expect. Everything just seemed too forced to be creative or interesting, yet not forced enough to the point where the campiness could've been entertaining in and of itself. I kept hoping that Clarke had some sort of gimmick lying in wait, ready to satisfy readers who put up with the novel - but no, nothing. Wouldn't it have spiced things up if at the very end, you had found out that this was all a dream? Or maybe a paranoid rant from the looney bin? I am having a great deal of trouble understanding why this has managed to get so much intelligista acclaim, while being panned consistently by regular readers. Did the critics really get through the whole mess? I'll give this doozy one star, for being able to pull the wool over their eyes (and, okay, fine, because the book jacket is clever).

Review # 2 was written on 2007-11-07 00:00:00 Olaf Nagel You know, I really considered giving up on this about sixty pages in, and I probably should have; it never got any better. It was just so un-compelling. And the main character was really unlikeable, which drives me nuts. It reminded me of A Confederacy of Dunces, which I don't remember much but definitely remember hating; this had the same kind of bumbling, not-very-smart protagonist who just doesn't seem to get why bad things keep happening to him. He was so whiny and stupid and boring. Why should I go on a three-hundred-page journey with someone I can't stand? The other thing that drove me absolutely crazy about this book was that the narrative kept doubling over on itself, like in the middle of describing some kind of action or reaction, it would start to discuss broader ideas and concepts, like "For those of us who've lost it, love is also the thing that makes us speak in aphorisms about love, which is why we try to get love back, so we can stop speaking that way. Aphoristically, that is." What? That's both convoluted and incredibly insipid. There were all these "realizations" or like comments on the human condition or something, which were uninspired and uninteresting and really just served to distract me from the uninspired and uninteresting plot. It reminded me, strangely, of one of my most favorite books ever, Daniel Handler's Adverbs , where he does a similar kind of thing, but with achingly beautiful metaphors, and with ideas that are thrilling and original and wonderful and sad. Brock Clarke is no Daniel Handler, is what I'm trying to say. And speaking of the writing? Ugh. Here is a convolutedly stupid metaphor, which happens right after our, uh, "hero" has relieved himself after needing to pee for a long time, and someone has just told him that he doesn't have any money. Says our "hero": "I empathized: his lack of money weighed heavily on him and he needed relief from it, his poverty being to his vessel what my pee had just been to mine." Ew. Idiotic. Here's one more quote, which combines bad writing with bad allusions with bad ideas: "I know nothing about her, not even her name, although I think about her all the time, the way you do about people and things which change your life forever -- although I doubt she thinks about me, which is the way life works, which is why I'm sure Noah couldn't ever stop thinking about his Flood, but once the water receded, I'm sure it didn't once think about him." What? Monumentally stupid. Just like this whole monumentally stupid book.