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Please don't go basing your PhD Thesis on anything I write here.
The information I provide comes with no guarantee of accuracy, and I'm just as likely to provide the most entertaining answer, as I am the factually correct answer.

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Monday 14 November 2011

What's wrong with Tom Clempson's book One Seriously Messed Up Week?



I write "What's wrong with Tom Clempson's book One Seriously Messed Up Week in the Otherwise Mundane & Uneventful Life of Sam Taylor Jack Samsonite?"





Hi Me, and thanks for being narcissistic enough to ask yourself a question on your own blog! Welcome.



Thanks. You so pwetty.


Aw shucks. And you're very observant.

For clarity's sake, would you mind being green and in italics, while I stick with black?

Sure.


Great!

Let's move on though, shall we?

Having read this book more than a few times, I have some opinions up the sleeve of my dust-jacket that answer your question. They're quite straight forward, so bullet points would probably be the best approach, BUT as you're the non-paying customer, I'll defer to your judgement. Bullet points? Yay or nay?

Ummm, yay. 
As in "yes", not yay as in "Yay! I'm a dag who gets excited over typography".

Oh, Mon-IQUE! As if you could ever be considered a dag!

In the interest of preventing RSI in my typing finger, from this point on I shall refer to the book by a condensed title - Week In The Otherwise.


Wouldn't "One Seriously Messed Up Week" or even just "Jack Samsonite" make more sense?


OoooooOOOOooooh. Who's the bossy one now?
Fine. Jack Samsonite it is.

Ok, so here we go. The 5 things wrong with Week In the Otherwise Jack Samsonite, in bullet points.

  • It's hard to get through;
  • The things I learned from the book are not useful;
  • I can't relate to the two main characters;
  • It hurt and embarrassed my husband;
  • I knew exactly what was going to happen in the story from page 1.


Whoa. That's a pretty harsh list. You must have really hated it then?


On the contrary; I loved it. I loved it because of all the things wrong with it.


Huh?

Are you sure we're the same person? 'Cause you seem kinda dim...


Huh?

Yeah...so anyway.

Let me explain my bullet points a bit more. Please try to keep up, Monique.

  • It's hard to get through;
I'm always out and about and like to carry a book or my e-reader (Justin BeBook) with me so I have something to do while my daughter is drowning at swimming lessons, or I'm in a cafe with The Boring Friends, or sitting in my car at the pedestrian crossing outside the retirement village up the road.

I could not do this with Jack Samsonite. It was just too firetrucking funny and I got sick of explaining to people that I was not crying tears of joy at Karina's side-breathing technique in the pool, I was actually laughing (which doesn't go down very well in parent circles). I was not showing off for attention; my latte nostril spurt was unintentional etc.

So it took me longer than usual to read because I could only do it at home, sans child, behind closed doors, after a toilet trip, with no hot liquids within reach. Very rare conditions in my life and it was hard to co-ordinate it all.

  • The things I learned from the book are not useful;
The things I learned from Jack all relate to teenage boy behaviour and despite photographic evidence of a disastrous pixie haircut-fail, I was never a teenage boy. I also don't have a son to impart this new wisdom on, so all-in-all it has rather gone to waste. When I explained the social etiquette of public urinal selection and the best fabric choice in trousers for disguising sneaky erections, Karina just looked at me blankly, then continued spinning around in her tutu to Katy Perry.
Jack also taught me how to make up a whole new set of swear words, but I'm too old to get away with using them now. Bloody cock-nuggets <------ see. It just seems creepy.

  • I can't relate to the two main characters;
Jack Samsonite is so much cooler than I ever was. Not in an unrealistic, 90210 way, but as a flawed hero - he's self-conscious, but only enough to ensure playground survival. He still manages to mostly be himself and fly under the radar.
When I was his age I had the flawed bit down pat, but I didn't have any coolness to plonk on the other end of the personality see-saw to balance it out. 
As for the love interest Eleanor, without giving too much of the plot away, SHE IS BAT CRAP CRAZY! From about the fifth page I was in love with Jack (in a non-creepy way. Mostly.), yet she, after years of being in the same school every day, was only just getting an inkling of how cool he was. I can't relate to dim people like that.

Huh?

Go back to sleep Monique.

  • It hurt and embarrassed my husband;
As I mentioned previously, I was never a teenage boy, so a lot of Jack's thinking and interactions with his friends were eye-opening to say the least. In lieu of Jack sitting next to me to girly-slap on the arm and say "That's DISGUSTING!", my poor husband copped the brunt of my disbelief, with bruises to show for it. He also put up with my constant questioning about the day-to-day logistics of having something between his legs that I do not have, which lead to much blushing and leg crossing from him.

  • I knew exactly what was going to happen in the story from page 1.
A good writer gives the gift of smugness to a reader by making them feel like they are one step ahead of the hero in the plot. I like spotting the seeds planted in a story as early as possible so I can pat myself on the back (metaphorically) and reward myself (literally, with chocolate) when my mad psychic powers and deductive logic merge and I correctly predict the outcome of a story.
I learned quite early on in life that when I flicked to the last page of a book and read that page first, I didn't enjoy the story and usually gave up at the halfway mark.
The first page of Jack Samsonite told me exactly how the story was going to finish as clearly as flipping to the back of the book would have done. But (um-ah, I started a sentence with a conjunction) much like my own teenage years, it wasn't the ending that was important or even satisfying, it was the journey that got me there. The true genius of the story is that there were still twists and surprises to keep me hooked despite knowing the conclusion.


So, Monique, those are the 5 things wrong with One Seriously Messed Up Week in the Otherwise Mundane & Uneventful Life of Sam Taylor Jack Samsonite, according to me. You may disagree with them - 

I don't.

- but nonetheless, there they are. 

We all know that two wrongs don't make a right. Jack Samsonite and I have proven you need at least 5.

Is that it? Are you finished?


Piss off and go read the book.




By Monique Kowalczyk

So what do you want to know?
MoniqueWillKnow@gmail.com

*Disclaimer*
Please don't go basing your PhD Thesis on anything I write here.
The information I provide comes with no guarantee of accuracy, and I'm just as likely to provide the most entertaining answer, as I am the factually correct answer.

3 comments:

  1. Ok, to favourite this blog post, go to this website - www.paypal.com and enter your credit card details (purely for verification) and a 6 digit number preceded by a $ sign. Click "send to Monique" and voila.

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  2. I loved it! Monique you are frigging hilarious.

    ReplyDelete