“Violin,” by Ann Rice

FM's rating:

1.      Premise 7

2.      Prose 8

3.      Plot 5

4.      Characters 8

5.      Overall 7

Comments (optional - but try to keep it under 3000 words!)

Tedious!  I like the story well enough, but like far too many, it feels like a short story stretched out into a novel.  Putting in what I call “filler” would be bad enough.  This story, told in first person, actually has the protagonist re-hashing the same thoughts over and over again, varying little more than the phrasing.  Yes, the character is obsessed with the death of loved ones over the years, and yes, such obsessive people do think of the same things all the time.  If that’s what Ms. Rice is attempting to illustrate here, it’s not really working for me.  At times, especially early in the book, the prose reads like poetry, just set as paragraphs instead of separate lines.  That works for this writer, and it isn’t overdone.  When we do get to dialog passages, the dialog is handled very well.  But then we’re back to the re-hashing of memories of her dead mother, her dead daughter, her dead whatever, and very little that’s new in between.  I read Rice’s “Interview with the Vampire” many years ago, but didn’t read the sequels because they were just too lengthy and I knew what to expect.  The movie was great!  Much, much later I read “Pandora,” seeing that it wasn’t a very thick book.  Tedious!  About halfway through this book, the pace begins to quicken a bit; we finally get to see where the story has been going.  Three quarters of the way through, we’re up to speed and going at a fairly nice pace.  By the time we get to the end, it’s a fine bit of work, but we had to pay too high a price to get there.  The twist at the climax – fittingly in the last seven pages – is worthy of the best short stories; which is what this should have been!



Here’s the November line-up!
“Lives of the Monster Dogs,” by Kirsten Bakis [11/7]
“Die Trying,” by Lee Child [11/14]
“Strangled Prose,” by Joan Hess [11/21]
“Downbelow Station,” by C.J. Cherryh [11/28]

(As always, if there are any books you’d like to recommend for the next month, please do so!)