Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

It is dangerous for writers,to write about writers. There is a sort of feedback loop that ensnares the author and pulls them down. This book is a good example, at least as it applies,to Lotto. All of the literary references and talk of his genius and runaway success sound implausible at best and self congratulatory at worst. I get what Groff is trying to do. But there are major flaws. The first is that she tries to develop the characters pathology from their childhoods, which can be fine, if it rings true. This doesn't. Lotto and Mathilde's back stories seemed more like a grab bag of events pulled out by some Dada artist: and then what kind of crazy thing happened -- rustle, rustle rustle -- he had sex on the roof of a house that was on fire! Doesn't mean much, but hey, let's pretend it led to a love of sex, or maybe is a way to transport him to New York - whatever. What truly maddened me was the implausibility of their relationship. Mega bitches have a hard time taking care of messy man-children for 23 years, all the while maintaining hot sex, and never having an argument. And unambitious Lotto accidentally becomes a famous playwrite, supported by his allegedly self interested wife, and remains charming enough that she, in all her bitchiness, decides to just work harder for him. I hated the first half, because it made no sense. The. I got to the second half and realized that this author has no idea what real long term marriage looks like. Nor is this a post modernist story that manipulates fact openly, e.g. gravity's Rainbow, Infinite Jest. Nope, it is just random stuff happening for no discernible reason. Or maybe it is Dada writing. The author decided that nothing has meaning so why not just write down a bunch of random sentences that are plausibly related. If that was the intent, then Groff succeeded. But I am angry that I wasted my time on this.