Born to Run Review
August 28, 2011
Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen by Christopher McDougall
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
If I judged books by their hype this would be a five star review. I’ve heard nothing but glowing praise.
To me the book did not live up to its’ billing. I guess my disappointed comes from what I expected. I knew Born to Run dealt with how running shoes are bad for us and that running like ancient tribes would lead to health.
Most of the book tells the various stories of people into ultra running. Ultra running is a bunch of crazy people running a hundred miles in the wilderness. Obviously, anyone who does this would be quirky ie. crazy. I found myself completely uninterested in these stories. I didn’t want quirky stories about querky people I wanted the science of running.
Near the end we do finally get two chapters that deal with the science behind proper running but it didn’t fill in any details I hadn’t already seen.
In short I came for science and I got propaganda.
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Elenium Review
July 9, 2011
The Elenium: The Diamond Throne, The Ruby Knight & The Sapphire Rose by David Eddings
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I find reviewing the Elenium rather difficult. As you can see I gave it three stars as a sign of my overall enjoyment of the books. The tone and style of the books changes from book to book. The second book reads like a fairy tale where nothing really makes sense and things just happen without explanation. Whereas the third book feels much more solid and deals with politics and armed strategy.
So ultimately what is bad about these books. Putting it bluntly, David Eddings is not a good writer. He breaks almost every rule I’ve heard of from writers workshops or books on writing. Overuse of adverbs abound. Show don’t tell, not for Eddings. The characters don’t discover the explanation, someone comes out of nowhere and just explains everything. Plot conundrums that are solved by literal dues ex machinas. There are things later in the books that contradict things from earlier. It’s derivative of previous fantasy works. Frodo and his friends have to take the ring into Mordor to destroy Sauron and Sparhawk and his friends have to take the jewel to Zemoch to kill Azash.
So why did I end up enjoying the books. I can’t put my finger on the specifics. Despite the fact that the characters are shallow and one dimensional I enjoyed reading about them. Despite that Eddings borrowed major plot elements, he executed the story differently. It often reads like a fairy tale. Where it is not all mechanistic, but vague and mystical. It’s almost whimsical and childlike at times.
It’s clearly intended for a young adult audience. If I had read this in my teens I probably would have been more forgiving of the flaws. Overall, I enjoyed the book, though I cringed a lot.
