Rhode Island Blues (2002)

Book Info

Author

Fay Weldon

Genre

Fiction

Rating

3.19 of 5 Votes: 5

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ISBN

080213873X (ISBN13: 9780802138736)

Language

English

Publisher

grove press

Shops

Amazon.com, Barnes & Noble

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About book Rhode Island Blues (2002)

This book has more errors than any book I can remember reading. The numerous misspellings, awkward sentence structure, and errors of fact litter the pages from beginning to end. Here are just a few:p. 11: "she had spent $100,000 dollars"; "what was $100,000 dollars" (using both the dollar sign and word "dollars"p. 117: "He reminded them both of what both would rather forget" (really awkward)p. 137: "A photograph of Alison . . . showed her with . . . mine and Angel's pale skin" (mine pale skin???)p. 188: arugula is spelled "arugala"p. 160: The artist Klimt is spelled "Klimpt"p. 191: "did not mean the rest on the world shared her fears" ("on" should be "of"; there are quite a number of these minor typos)p. 86: "Francine had died three years before Joy," (wow--Joy is a living character in the book, whose sister Francine, we are told on p. 64, died a year ago.)p 105: "But never enough nothing to make up for the something" should be "But never enough something to make up for the nothing" (in disussion of slot-machine winnings)p. 135: "lone mothers might ask you round to Christmas dinner, but what with . . . made me disinclined to accept" (incorrect syntax).And for some reason, long compound sentences tend not to have commas needed for clarity, and simple sentences or clauses often have unnecessary commas.

This is a fun book, but has the usual Fay Weldon excesses in some places. How she does go on sometimes! But I liked the characters a lot and enjoyed the unfolding of the story.

Do You like book Rhode Island Blues (2002)?

This book started out charming and affectionate, and ended up cynical and affected. I really enjoy satire with a heart, like Richard Russo's Straight Man, but I thought that in this book, Weldon sucked all of the heart out of the characters by the end. As a result, I found the experience of reading this book profoundly disappointing. I also thought there were some strange messages about adoption and LGBT issues, which were hard to make sense of. There were a lot of throwaway lines about gay people, which were unnecessary, and sometimes offensive. And for a book which was all about family, there was not really a sophisticated exploration of the meaning of family in relation to biology, adoption, and identity. This book lacked depth in both characterization and themes, and as a result, was a frustrating and often unpleasant read.
—Karen