Location: Canada
Member Since:
May 23, 2020
Stegosauri
Stegosauri's favorite authors on Smashwords
Smashwords book reviews by Stegosauri
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Good Grief
on Sep. 08, 2020
"Witty, cleverly plotted, with memorable characters, and with scenarios outlandish enough to somehow ring true." Full disclosure: the author is a friend. That said, I have always found his writing to be entertaining and informative. "Good Grief" is a successful leap forward. As a longtime fan of the comic mystery caper genre (Westlake's Dortmunder series, Carl Hiassen, etc.) I'm impressed with Jim's ability to bring together disparate plot threads, diverse colourful characters, and several underlying themes into a coherent whole. It takes a bit of time for this complex web to be built and intertwine, but the process is intriguing enough to keep the reader involved. This is not an easy genre, but Good Grief succeeds with the right balance of improbable situations and credible character reactions. While there are archetypal elements, the main characters are not one-dimensional. I find it's often better to resist giving an immediate opinion on a work (music and art included) and to let it roll around in your mind to see if it has staying power. I'm still visualizing scenes from Good Grief a couple of months after reading, which I think is perhaps the ultimate compliment I can pay the book. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.