Robert F. Jablon

SERIOUSLY DISAPPOINTED

Revisado: 04-25-20

After reading “14” and “The Fold,” I had high hopes for this one (let’s just pretend “Dead Moon” never happened). But sadly, this one did nothing to advance the story. No new mystery. We learn nothing new about the Monsters. The prose is lackluster, the dialogue cheesy, characters are so shallowly drawn they’re barely there (and what we do learn of them is either cliche or boring), and the ending hardly deserves the term. The science is lame, barely grade-school when it’s not flat-out wrong. If you’re a 14-year-old fan boy you might like the action but I was really hoping for some depth. Clines seems to have based his work on B-movies, comics and horror films - he even annoyingly name-checks his inspirations throughout (‘Crisis on Infinite Earths’? Thanos? Really?). But copying tropes from shallow material just gives you regurgitated pap. When I can predict on page one how the villain ends up, that’s not good. And Clines knows it - he even ironically notes the movie cliches as they come up. SEMI-SPOILER: Unstoppable monsters are boring, and nobody even tries here. No fight, few heroics. It’s all about running. Jason Vorhees and that guy with the burned face are scary for one or two movies. After that, what’s the point? What’s more, what about these guys? If these are alpha predators, where did they come from? Do they breed? Did they evolve or were they created? If either, they have weaknesses. Parasites? Predators? Germs? Each other? How smart are they? Enquiring minds want to know. Seems like some scientist risking everything to find out would be a cool story. BACK TO REVIEW: Another problem for me: nobody seems to care about anything. Lives are being lost, billions of people are at risk, and I don’t feel anybody’s pain. Clines needs to read about real disasters, real wars, genocides, stories of how real people cope with real trauma. Make real, complicated people. Grow up. Graphic novels did that for comics. J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series got darker, deeper and more fascinating as its characters grew. Clines is a writer. He needs to read. There are wonderful works in his genre and in related ones. Genre doesn’t mean shallow. Think of The Time Machine, Melmoth by Sarah Perry, works by Ray Bradbury, Ben Aaronovitch. Robert Heinlein, dozens of others. Sorry to be so long and scathing but it’s because I really like Clines’ world and it deserves a better chronicle. I know Clines can do better. I’ll be waiting.

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THE JUNK FOOD OF POP HISTORY

Revisado: 05-24-16

What did you love best about The Great British Dream Factory?

Its chatty, gossipy anecdotes about cultural heroes. Also, David Thorpe's gung-ho narration, complete with dozens of voices (although all his Americans seem to talk like New York gangsters.

Would you recommend The Great British Dream Factory to your friends? Why or why not?

Absolutely. It's entertaining nostalgia with a dash of historical through-line to hold it together. Not much nourishment but very tasty.

Which character – as performed by David Thorpe – was your favorite?

Loved his Northern accents.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

DICKENS, H.G. WELLS, BLACK SABBATH: HOW BRITS CONQUERED THE WORLD!!!!

Any additional comments?

Sandbrook is always enjoyable, although there's much less serious research in this tome. Basically, Sandbrook argues that Britain has given the world an enormous trove of culture over the decades, from Dickens novels to "Downton Abbey" and that all of it embraces a handful of themes: historical nostalgia; public school tales; love-hate relationships with the class system, and the working-boy-makes-good story (there are virtually no women in the book). Sandbrook cherry-picks to make his case (after all, Japan could make the same case for cultural dominance with sushi, anime and "The Ring") but who couldn't like a book that mentions everyone from Margaret Thatcher to Harry Potter and "The Prisoner?" Unfortunately, and for no good reason, Sandbrook spends way too much time slagging John Lennon as a hypocritical narcissist (he also took a shot at Lennon in a previous book). It adds nothing to his thesis and comes off as petty. Overall, though, Nobody does pop history like Sandbrook.

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STATE OF EXCELLENCE

Revisado: 06-10-13

Where does State of Emergency rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

In the Top 10

Any additional comments?

Dominic Sandbrook's incremental histories about Britain in the post-war decades continue to enthrall me. He's perceptive, broad-reaching and witty, all at the same time. Who else can handle the bloodshed in Northern Ireland, miners' strikes, frozen fish fingers and the plots of "Dr. Who" shows and make them all work together thematically? For some, the ins and outs of British politics and culture may be too much detail but I found he manages to weave a great story while explaining an amazingly complicated period marked by sweeping change. David Thorpe does a wonderfully entertaining job as narrator _ even managing credible accents for a variety of characters, from Edward Heath to football hooligans (although his Italian accent is terrible and he tends to make all Americans sound a bit like B-movie gangsters). I loved this book and the followup, "Seasons in the Sun," and look forward to the next installment. I also recommend that Audible get Thorpe to do the previous books in the series, "White Heat" and "Never Had It So Good."

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