Underwhelming

It's been ridiculously hard to make it through this audiobook. I just couldn't figure it out and, although there were occasional sections where I'd feel I might finally be getting it, nothing grabbed and held onto my attention.

There's a lot of coverage of what the protagonist Quinn Jones refers to as Asian gang violence in NYC's Chinatown, with references to deep distrust of American soldiers after the US left Viet Nam in the 1970s. The protagonist's now-dead husband was apparently instrumental in covert operations locating and rescuing American POWs post-war. The text in this regard is dark, with overly graphic descriptions of violence and torture. I would suggest the publisher print a trigger warning for this content.

Clearly the author is not dealing with funny subject matter but alas, humour is applied to the text in the most inappropriate ways. I do like a bit of black humour when it's done well, but this is neither humour nor done well.

In a schizophrenic twist, Jones and her friends do a lot of fine dining, with long, eloquent descriptions of the food they are served. The other themes are designer clothing and perfume, all of which garner equally long, eloquent descriptions. I estimate that at least fifty per cent of the book is about food and fashion.

In the shadow of her recent widowhood, Jones acquires two new suitors, one of whom is much younger than she, and the other, a much older stereotypical metrosexual. There's a lot of repetitive discussion about whether or not he's gay because he adores fashion, 'gayness' that he vehemently denies. I truly didn't understand why his not being gay was so important to the author. It seems the kind of thing that could be said once and then left alone, and it's not pivotal to the story in any way. She shlepps the two men around with her and then pits them against each other, as though she's some sort of princess neither of them is worthy of. She seems to take a lot of pleasure in belittling them.

To top it off, the lead character is a bit of a moron. She's the idiot who goes into the dark basement when the entire audience is yelling at her to not go in the basement.

The audiobook is much too long to tolerate a solo narrator all the way through. Liking or not liking her voice is not the issue — it’s her questionable interpretation of the text. In one instance, where the text says the man speaks in a ‘monotone,’ she emotes her face off. Either she doesn’t know what ‘monotone’ means or she thinks she knows better than the author, who has kindly provided the narrator with specific direction on how that character speaks in this scene. Oy.

My rating is two out of five stars.

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