Let me just set the record straight before I begin ripping this book apart: I was in Eastern Europe and had NO other book choices. Not a single one. I learned a long time ago to stay away from the Oprah selections. Don't get me wrong, I like her (and doesn't everyone like the big O, besides perhaps, er, James Frey?). I just think she has horrific taste in books, as she tends to choose subject matter (usually involving abuse, affairs and/or alcohol) over the author's actual writing ability.
Melodrama seems to be the defining element of the genre of so-called "women's" lit, and it is in full supply here in The Pilot's Wife. Chick lit is about sex; women's lit is about feelings. (This demand for plot over talky-talky is starting to make me feel like a man). But seriously, these books are not great literature -- if I wanted a tedious exposition on life and love, I would pick up Madame Bovary and at least notch a classic.
For example: After the in-air death of her pilot husband, our heroine ponders..."What was it like to watch the cockpit split away from the cabin, and then to feel yourself, still harnessed to your seat, falling through the night, knowing that you would hit the water at terminal velocity, as surely Jack would have known if he were conscious." ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!? How did this shlock get through her editor? I hate to be the realist here, but Ms. Shreve, Jack wouldn't have seen or felt anything, seeing as a bomb went off about a foot from where he was standing.
On top of the melodrama are pat phrases that would be better stiched onto a sampler: Sometimes, she thought, courage was simply a matter of putting one foot in front of the other and not stopping." Or how about this one: "To be relieved of love, she thought, was to give up a terrible burden." It's like she didn't even try while writing this book, and it's an insult to the intelligence of the reader. For the millions of dollars that Anita Shreve gets paid to churn out these books, she could at least attempt to be a wee bit insightful.
It leaves me with one question, really: did I actually waste hours of my life reading this drivel?
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