maya � (we're so back) is on page 33 of 149 of Tokyo Express: we’re slow-cooking� hope it’s a tasty stew

"grabbed this from the library today to read as spring starts!

�

I've finished this book after three weeks of picking it up and putting it down, and I feel thoroughly underwhelmed. With all the praise that's been lavished on Ali Smith's Seasonal Quartet, I was expecting more from this—something that would make me feel like spring does, with its wind and rains and sun peering out from behind the clouds. What I got was disconnected, impersonal writing about characters that resemble caricatures more than dimensional people, and a plot about immigration that felt less like a meaningful part of the story than an excuse for the author to espouse her political beliefs. In fairness, I agree entirely with Smith's politics, but the way she presented these ideas in her book was boring and contrived.

As of late, I've noticed a problem with literary fiction. Everyone wants to write the next great Sally Rooney novel. They want Rooney's detachment, salient observation of events around her, and her characters who cannot exist outside of a book yet teach you how to live by virtue of being within it. (Incidentally, the observation the last part of that sentence is based on is one of the only things I like about Spring). Rooney, however, appears to have an edge on those who seem to grasp at her style. Her stories are suffused with life; stories, joy, meaning, dimension. She has an unerring capacity to capture the world around her without compromising the beauty of her craft. The same cannot be said of Ali Smith, who recycles verbs and bland adjectives in sparse sentences that begin to repeat each other. 'Uninspired' doesn't begin to capture itâ€�'derivative' and 'mind-numbing' might. What is his laughing made fury go furiously all through her supposed to mean? How are there so many people on Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ praising this kind of writing?

I also felt as though the author's presentation of her political views were insipid and irritating. There are sections devoted to such meaningful concepts as phones are bad, conveyed in the same manner a child might argue for a second piece of candy, which is to say bothersome enough to make me want to sign my soul over to a capitalist oligarchy if only to be spared reading the sanctimonious nonsense that characterized this section. I am interested in British politics. I have wanted to move to the UK for almost my entire life, and I have spent a lot of time researching and considering the history of the country as well as its political present. Despite all this, the latter section of the book made me want to bash my head into a wall with the attempted preaching brought on by the child equivalent of a manic pixie dream girl. Spare me. If you have an opinion essay to write, write an opinion essay. Don't make it a novel.

Sometimes you have to admit that you will never understand the interest in a beloved author, series, or novel. Spring is one of those books for me. While it has garnered a lot of praise, I found little to enjoy in this vapid piece of work. I liked the piece of Autumn I read much better, so maybe I will give the other books in this quartet a try, but I do not expect them to be worth my time. Cheers."