Throwbacks

I found notes on these titles ingeniously hidden in my email, and various other places I thought (at the time) would be a good place to make my future self find them. It's not a huge number of items, and none I finished.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Thomas Sweterlitsch. I placed this on hold as a possibility for an upcoming program. It isn't a good fit for the program, and also I didn't enjoy it very much.  The world building is interesting, but not enough information is shared; there too many new elements, all only hinted at, none explained.  This would be for dedicated sci-fi readers only; it's not a good genre-seducer.

First Impressions by Charlie Lovett.  I so loved Lovett's The Bookman's Tale.  I kept waffling on this: to read or not to read?  Second books are frequently such a let-down, but once in a while (like Susan Pfeffer), you get a sophomore book that's even better than the first.  

Turns out, this isn't bad, just not captivating. Plus, the Jane Austen thing.  I'm just not into it.

Beautiful Disaster by Janie McGuire.  Well, some sort of disaster, at any rate.  I saw this well-reviewed a number of times, and while the book isn't good, I'm just as annoyed at the reviewers.  1) "New Adult" novels can include characters outside of the 18-19 range.  2)  Even young-ish adults should be able to choose books on relevant topics and characters their own age that don't sacrifice writing quality.  

The writing is too simple-- the characters are shallow and predictable-- and overwritten-- every line of dialogue is underscored with macro facial expressions, winks, or practiced nonchalant body movements.