David Goodwillie

When I read this book, I was particularly interested in the passages in which Goodwillie wrote about one of his jobs as a sports memorabilia cataloger for an auction house, because I was considering applying for a job as a cataloger for an auction house myself (not in the sports department, I hasten to add). Having read about his amusing experiences as a cataloger, my anxiety was considerably lessened, and I applied for the job. I got it -- and he was right about the ridiculousness of a lot of the cataloging process. I realize this narrow-focus review is like the old David Letterman bits where he would ask a dentist on to give a dental-centric review of Marathon Man, or something, but, these parts of the book interested me the most. And, sadly, they made up only a tiny portion of the book. If anyone knows of other books which feature the exciting world of auction cataloging, please share -- I must know about them!… (mehr)

Well, this is definitely going on the list of books I would never read if I didn't have to. Some highlights:
1) multiple 1st person POV -- ugh. Just, ugh.
2) female characters are all props -- you wouldn't think this would be possible when one of the protagonists is female, but she manages to have absolutely no identity that doesn't derive from a man; it would be an impressive feat if it weren't so maddening.
3) plot makes NO LOGICAL SENSE -- especially the "romance" bits.
4) infodumps boring, tangential details, then glosses over things that might have been interesting.

Basically: I recommend this book to NO ONE EVER. The only good part was the title. ARGH.… (mehr)