[stylist] Sharing a link

Thu Apr 2 15:26:22 UTC 2015

http://www.writing-world.com/fiction/yes.shtml

Write On,
Atty

-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Jacobson,
Shawn D via stylist
Sent: Thursday, April 2, 2015 9:39 AM
To: 'Vejas Vasiliauskas'; 'Writers' Division Mailing List'
Subject: Re: [stylist] could anyone read this please?

Vejas

As someone who appreciates a good book review (and who has toyed with
writing them), I was interested to see what you had written.

My experience is that different book reviewers have different philosophies
about writing negative reviews.  The reviewer for Analog magazine does not
write them because he feels his purpose is to turn people on to good books.
Other reviewers will write negative reviews.  Keep the purpose of your
review in mind.  It looks like you're purpose is to say that this book was
not according to my taste and this is why.

You really don't need the last sentence since the reader will make his own
decision anyway.

Otherwise, a good first effort.

Shawn
-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Vejas
Vasiliauskas via stylist
Sent: Thursday, April 02, 2015 12:21 AM
To: stylist at nfbnet.org
Subject: [stylist] could anyone read this please?

Hi All,
I have to write a newspaper book review on the memoir that I read for
school.  I have almost two weeks to do it.  Because I didn't particularly
care for my book, I decided to write a negative review.  (And yes, despite
the fact that I enjoy using British spelling this review is strictly
American).  It seems like many newspaper reviews just rave about how
absolutely AMAZING a book is.  It doesn't matter to me that you haven't read
the book, I am just looking for structural suggesttions.  I am also more
than happy to clarify anything about what I have written.  What I have
written below is just a very rough draft from a book review beginner.
Thank you for all suggesttions.
Vejas
Immigrant by Sally Bennett
When I found out that I had to read a memoir, I decided that I wanted to
read one about someone from another country.  Learning about other cultures
has always been an interest of mine.  I was very excited to find that this
author was from England, because I have always been interested in everything
about the UK, such as its culture and its differences in language compared
with American English. 
The author, Sally Bennett, was born in 1932 in Yorkshire, England.  She then
moved to Spain at age 1 because  her mother had an affair with an American
man named Jack Pratt, who was living there at the time.  After a while they
moved to Portugal.  
While in Portugal, Sally gained a little sister, and her stepfather left the
family.  Sally, her mother and sister moved to Portugal, and then to Georgia
in the United States, then later back to Portugal, the UK and finally back
to the US, this time in Virginia, where she finished high school.  She has
been living in America ever since.
As one might assume, Sally's life was far from a party.  She only very
occasionally had a chance to see her father in England, and her relationship
with her mother, who was not the most maternal of women, was not helped by
the oblious cultural divide that came with growing up in two countries-even
ones with the same language.  She says of her general experience as an
immigrant: "I understand the immigrant's seemingly perverse longing for a
place called home, a siren song that often precludes creating a happier life
in new surroundings.  The familiar voices, customs, and landscape set down
in infancy seem normal and right.  Whatever comes later, after language
allows us to shape our world, determines the course of our lives, but our
emotions are forever washed in these earliest impressions." (3).
I do not know if I would recommend this book to anyone.  While Sally
Bennett's family history is interesting, the book lacks lots of cultural
detail, and the writing is a bit banal.  
However, the writer cannot be blamed completely for this.  While she
definitely could have focused more on the differences between growing up in
England versus growing up in America, she herself did not receive the most
culturally diverse experience.  Her life in England, limited to short breaks
with her father and a very small period living with her mother, did not give
her much time to really experience culture.  While she lived in Portugal for
a rather long time, her family always mingled with the English expat
community, and the book fails to mention anything about Portugese or Spanish
culture, which may have been something she never bothered to care about
while there.  Another thing to keep in mind about this book is that the
author was born in 1932 and the book was just published in 2013.  While the
mind of an 81-year-old can still be sharp, she will not have the vivid
memories that she would still have had in her twenties and thirties.
Another aspect of the book that really did not sit well with me is that
there are two chapters in which Sally's mother, Sylvia, is portrayed in the
third-person narrative as a teenage girl.  
While I have a great relationship with my parents and know quite a lot about
their families, I would not know enough about their school lives in order to
accurately write two chapters about them as teenagers, especially if my
parents were not alive for me to ask them any questions that come up.  This
must mean that, while some of the foundation material for these chapters is
accurate, much of it was just added detail which the author created as
fillers.  One very particularly  unrealistic character description in these
chapters is that of Grace, Sylvia's best friend while attending boarding
school during the Victorian era.  
The author never says the exact words, but it is implied by the ones she
does use that Grace is gay.  Grace would often openly tell her best friend
Sylvia, "I love you." As we now live in a time when people are finding it
hard to come out and even commit suicide because of it, it seems strange
that a girl in 1900 will be so open about her feelings.
Do I regret reading this book? No; I did find the story of Sally's family
interesting and the few bits of cultural differences enticing.  Therefore, I
shall leave it up to the reader of this review to decide whether or not this
book is worth their time.

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