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A review by siobhancollierauthor
Anna K: A Love Story by Jenny Lee
1.0
I did it. I DNFed at page 13.
Look, I love modern retellings of classics - I watched Clueless the other night and remembered it was a 90’s version of Emma by Jane Austen. 10 Thing I Hate About You is a great version of The Tempest. Two books I’ve read this year - Take A Chance On Me by Beth Garrod and My Type On Paper by Chloe Seager- have had a solid go at retelling Mamma Mia! And they both worked it. Done well, a modern retelling is a great way of reintroducing a classic into a setting that is familiar for readers.
But this is almost like a copy/paste of Tolstoy. I read it, I fucking LOVED it. I was excited for something modern that had similar themes, but this is way too close to the source material. Those examples above worked because they stuck close to the themes of the story, the basic outline, and the character attributes that made the originals so well rounded. They didn’t have chapters that could verbatim be lifted from the original and highlight/replace names, locations, modern appliances etc.
And the storytelling is so dry. While that works for classic writers like Dumas, Melville (still haven’t forgiven Melville for 43 surplus chapters of whale information in Moby Dick), Tolstoy, the Brontes etc etc because their settings had to be accessible in a much bigger world, in today’s writing it is a major infodump. Consider the character I just read about, Dustin. He was introduced as a friend of Steven, who was in a fight scene with his girlfriend, and then for the entirety of chapter two it’s how Dustin and Steven know each other. It’s dense and dry and it’s a major tell-don’t-show which is a huge rule break for me.
And I have this much to say and this much negativity from 10 pages. TEN PAGES. Maybe it gets better, but I doubt it. And I’m sad, because I love my high society American high school books (Kate Brian’s Privileged series, American Royals) and this book should have had all my 5 star marks just on premise alone. Ugh, I’m so disappointed!
Look, I love modern retellings of classics - I watched Clueless the other night and remembered it was a 90’s version of Emma by Jane Austen. 10 Thing I Hate About You is a great version of The Tempest. Two books I’ve read this year - Take A Chance On Me by Beth Garrod and My Type On Paper by Chloe Seager- have had a solid go at retelling Mamma Mia! And they both worked it. Done well, a modern retelling is a great way of reintroducing a classic into a setting that is familiar for readers.
But this is almost like a copy/paste of Tolstoy. I read it, I fucking LOVED it. I was excited for something modern that had similar themes, but this is way too close to the source material. Those examples above worked because they stuck close to the themes of the story, the basic outline, and the character attributes that made the originals so well rounded. They didn’t have chapters that could verbatim be lifted from the original and highlight/replace names, locations, modern appliances etc.
And the storytelling is so dry. While that works for classic writers like Dumas, Melville (still haven’t forgiven Melville for 43 surplus chapters of whale information in Moby Dick), Tolstoy, the Brontes etc etc because their settings had to be accessible in a much bigger world, in today’s writing it is a major infodump. Consider the character I just read about, Dustin. He was introduced as a friend of Steven, who was in a fight scene with his girlfriend, and then for the entirety of chapter two it’s how Dustin and Steven know each other. It’s dense and dry and it’s a major tell-don’t-show which is a huge rule break for me.
And I have this much to say and this much negativity from 10 pages. TEN PAGES. Maybe it gets better, but I doubt it. And I’m sad, because I love my high society American high school books (Kate Brian’s Privileged series, American Royals) and this book should have had all my 5 star marks just on premise alone. Ugh, I’m so disappointed!