Laura’s review of She's Come Undone > Likes and Comments
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Yeah, because the plot of this thing is so unpredictable that you can't figure out on the first page what's going to happen. As I said, it's an episode of Dr. Phil. In any event, half this stuff happens in the first ten pages or so.
Ugh... If you are going to reveal the whole book please click the spoiler box so those of us that haven't read it won't have the whole book ruined.
I didn't reveal the whole book, for Christ sake. I revealed a couple of plot points, most of which either happen very early on in the book or are actually, you know, on the cover copy or in the Goodreads description of the book. If that ruins the "whole book" for you -- well, I don't quite know what to tell you.
Really, you spoiler police need to develop some critical thinking skills. Sheesh.
Laura: If you hated this Lamb-abomination, do not read "The Hour I First Believed." That book manages to combine the Columbine shooting, Hurricane Katrina, presciption drug abuse, a DUI homicide, closeted lesbian love, alcoholism, sexual abuse of female prisoners by prison guards, parental abandonment, possible suicide because someone thinks he might be gay, mental illness, a prodigal son story, the fixing of the Miss Ballantine contest, a biracial affair that leads to murder, more mental illness, etc. etc. God, what a mess. I read "She's Come Undone" so I have no idea why I put myself through "The Hour I First Believed" but hear my plea and learn from my mistake.
Believe me, you don't have to ask me twice. For some reason, I tried to read, um, what was the name of his other one about the schizophrenic guy? I can't even remember and I refuse to look it up. NEVER again. He is just the worst.
Lucky for me I wasn't able to make it past the first 30 pages.
Not lucky -- smart. I, like an idiot, plowed through the entire thing.
Somehow I think there is a third plane called "The Land of Good Fiction" which is slightly higher than the land of romance novels (which is a mixture of wonderful places and awful places), but much, much higher than the barren landscape that the Lamb characters seem to inhabit.
Absolutely hated this book. I am still haunted by it. Can't stop myself from thinking about it every time I go through a toll booth.
Try putting it through a shredder. I'm not joking. That's what I did with A Million Little Pieces, and it actually helped me get over being furious that I wasted my time on it.
Wish I could have done that with "The Lake of Dreams" but it was a book on CD abd would have ruined the shredder.
You could try throwing it on the floor and stomping on it, but that may be too dramatic, I guess.
Finding out that someone likes this book can change how I feel about them.
I'm considering proposing to you, Laura.
I accept!
Agree with the first part of your post, btw. If someone who sends a friend request gives this book more than two stars -- nuh uh. And a two-star rating is suspect.
rachelle wrote: "Finding out that someone likes this book can change how I feel about them.
I'm considering proposing to you, Laura."
That is a wonderful test!
Now children stop fighting its just a book.
god I felt the same way! I HATED this book - and was pissed I felt compelled to finish it!
This book was a bit of a life-changer for me: I used to feel compelled to read a book all the way to the end - perhaps due to time already invested, a hope the book would redeem itself, or a previously undiscovered masochistic streak. I believe this was the first book to break of me of that bad habit, and I found myself taking Dorothy Parker’s advice. “This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.” So, thank you, She’s Come Undone for teaching me to value my time better!
I think I did throw it, actually! Very satisfying.
I don't hate the book but your review made me giggle.
I'm the type of person who has to finish a book once I start it but man, this book... This book was just horrid. It was so unnecessarily depressing and was poorly written to boot. I wish I had read your awesome review before "choking down" this book but alas, it was much too late. Hopefully we can save other wretched souls with these reviews so they don't have to suffer our same fate...
I sure hope so. Although I think we may be too late: it has about six zillion reviews on Amazon (mostly raves -- go figure that one out).
I am reading "The Age of Miracles." It has a scene with whales beaching themselves. It was like a flashback to this book, and I shivered in horror.
note to self: do not read "The Age of Miracles".
I read this so many years ago I dont even remember the story but I remember that I liked it. I was 17 at the time but seeing all this hatred for it makes me want to read it again to see what the fuss is about. I dont understand how anyone can be so passionately disgusted by a book. its just a book. wanna ready a sucky ass story with no real point and so many holes in the plot you can see through it? Try The Pact by Jodi Picoult. Now thats an author I will never try again. Still dont completely hate it though because I havent the energy.
Um. It doesn't exactly take a lot of energy to dislike a book. You sit, you read, you hate. Pretty low-key, by my lights. Hell, your comment is nearly as long as my review, so if that's your standard, seems to me your energy levels are through the roof.
I personally love this book .. the repeated comments about how many bad things can happen to this girl blah blah blah... sorry not every Novel has a happy ending although a bit extreme with some situations this is the sort of chaotic downward spiral that happens with trauma.. not always or with everyone but he was trying to capture a girl with serious mental illness and trauma on top of it. it isnt supposed to be a pretty fairy tale
Best review on GR. So nice to see someone with a simliar view on this p.o.s "novel".
Best review on GR. So nice to see someone with a simliar view on this p.o.s "novel".
I read this based on the good blurbs about it about 9 years ago...it took me forever to slog through and the whole reason I did was because of the good reviews...just waiting for the plot to get good...and it never did. After Dolores killed the fish I couldn't even stand her anymore. And the stuff with Dante was just weird. The most baffling things about the good review blurbs on the back were the insistence that a. This book was funny, and b. Lamb knew how to write about the "female experience." (What, there's only one?) Here's a few male authors who are SO much better at writing women than Lamb: Manil Suri (The City of Devi). Silas House (A Parchment of Leaves). Leo Tolstoy (Anna Karenina). Victor Hugo (Les Miserables). Kazuo Ishiguro (Never Let Me Go and A Pale View of Hills). Ian McEwan (Atonement). Lamb...no.
Disagree that Les Miserables was a better account of the female experience than She's Come Undone. And to the person who said, "How many bad things can happen to one person?" Seriously?
I read reviews because they sometimes make me laugh-like yours.
For some reason, my feed says I've read this book but I have not, nor do I now intend to do so.
This review made me laugh so hard. Only sorry that you missed mentioning the earworm-inducing title...but it's not TOO LATE (too laaayyyyaaaayyyyaaaaayyyyaaatuh) for me to do it here:
She's come undone
She didn't know what she was headed for
And when I found what she was headed for
It was too late
Just another reason (at least for me) for hating on this book. Plus the jacket art. Maybe that last point is unfair as often outside the author's control, but the whole package makes me cringe.
NO GUESS WHO ON MY REVIEW PAGE!!!!
(But it made me laugh, too, I must admit.)
I hated it.I thought i was the only one.
Never again!
Dear, dear Akosua, you will never be alone in disdain of Lamb!!
I believe that you're getting flagged as spoilers because you mention the rape and that's a major plot point not revealed until at least midway and not on the book flap at all. I appreciate your disdain although I disagree but please don't ruin it for others.
I just finished reading the book and could not disagree more. It was a well-written, raw portrayal of the way we are sometimes our own worst enemies.
Bradley wrote: "I believe that you're getting flagged as spoilers because you mention the rape and that's a major plot point not revealed until at least midway and not on the book flap at all. I appreciate your di..."
The rape happens WAY before the midpoint of the book. Sorry, but I'm not of the school that revealing one incident that occurs in the first few pages of a book constitutes a spoiler that has to be tagged. There are 400-some pages to go after that; if my revealing one plot point early on ruins the entire book for you, then I don't know what to tell you.
I read this book quite some time ago for my book club and didn't hate it or love it, but we had so darn much fun talking about it at our get-together that I ended up giving it three stars just for the enjoyment of our discussion. For many meetings afterwards, it was brought up on many occasions for one reason or another for another round of laughs. I really do believe Lamb wrote this "tongue in cheek."
My book club has a book like that too: "On Elegance While Sleeping." We all hated it, but it's been good for laughs for around three years now.
Laura wrote: "My book club has a book like that too: "On Elegance While Sleeping." We all hated it, but it's been good for laughs for around three years now."
I'll have to check this one out!! Never too many laughs!!
This review --and its comments -- have been such a source of delight for me over the years. So nice to have it pop back up in my feed! (Recommended For: Masochists.)
I read it at work one summer. I found it depressing; however, I devoured because I recognized places in my hometown and surrounding area.
yes many of your comments are spoilers and it wouldn't have taken very much effort to indicate that in your review. If fact, probably far less effort than replying with all of your defensive comments every time someone disagrees with you. I am in the middle of this book and there were several things I wouldn't have liked to have read in your review prior to finishing it, if I had chosen to.
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May 01, 2008 03:59AM
Yeah, because the plot of this thing is so unpredictable that you can't figure out on the first page what's going to happen. As I said, it's an episode of Dr. Phil. In any event, half this stuff happens in the first ten pages or so.
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Ugh... If you are going to reveal the whole book please click the spoiler box so those of us that haven't read it won't have the whole book ruined.
I didn't reveal the whole book, for Christ sake. I revealed a couple of plot points, most of which either happen very early on in the book or are actually, you know, on the cover copy or in the Goodreads description of the book. If that ruins the "whole book" for you -- well, I don't quite know what to tell you.Really, you spoiler police need to develop some critical thinking skills. Sheesh.
Laura: If you hated this Lamb-abomination, do not read "The Hour I First Believed." That book manages to combine the Columbine shooting, Hurricane Katrina, presciption drug abuse, a DUI homicide, closeted lesbian love, alcoholism, sexual abuse of female prisoners by prison guards, parental abandonment, possible suicide because someone thinks he might be gay, mental illness, a prodigal son story, the fixing of the Miss Ballantine contest, a biracial affair that leads to murder, more mental illness, etc. etc. God, what a mess. I read "She's Come Undone" so I have no idea why I put myself through "The Hour I First Believed" but hear my plea and learn from my mistake.
Believe me, you don't have to ask me twice. For some reason, I tried to read, um, what was the name of his other one about the schizophrenic guy? I can't even remember and I refuse to look it up. NEVER again. He is just the worst.
Lucky for me I wasn't able to make it past the first 30 pages.
Not lucky -- smart. I, like an idiot, plowed through the entire thing.
Somehow I think there is a third plane called "The Land of Good Fiction" which is slightly higher than the land of romance novels (which is a mixture of wonderful places and awful places), but much, much higher than the barren landscape that the Lamb characters seem to inhabit.
Absolutely hated this book. I am still haunted by it. Can't stop myself from thinking about it every time I go through a toll booth.
Try putting it through a shredder. I'm not joking. That's what I did with A Million Little Pieces, and it actually helped me get over being furious that I wasted my time on it.
Wish I could have done that with "The Lake of Dreams" but it was a book on CD abd would have ruined the shredder.
You could try throwing it on the floor and stomping on it, but that may be too dramatic, I guess.
Finding out that someone likes this book can change how I feel about them.I'm considering proposing to you, Laura.
I accept!Agree with the first part of your post, btw. If someone who sends a friend request gives this book more than two stars -- nuh uh. And a two-star rating is suspect.
rachelle wrote: "Finding out that someone likes this book can change how I feel about them.I'm considering proposing to you, Laura."
That is a wonderful test!
Now children stop fighting its just a book.
god I felt the same way! I HATED this book - and was pissed I felt compelled to finish it!
This book was a bit of a life-changer for me: I used to feel compelled to read a book all the way to the end - perhaps due to time already invested, a hope the book would redeem itself, or a previously undiscovered masochistic streak. I believe this was the first book to break of me of that bad habit, and I found myself taking Dorothy Parker’s advice. “This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.” So, thank you, She’s Come Undone for teaching me to value my time better!
I think I did throw it, actually! Very satisfying.
I don't hate the book but your review made me giggle.
I'm the type of person who has to finish a book once I start it but man, this book... This book was just horrid. It was so unnecessarily depressing and was poorly written to boot. I wish I had read your awesome review before "choking down" this book but alas, it was much too late. Hopefully we can save other wretched souls with these reviews so they don't have to suffer our same fate...
I sure hope so. Although I think we may be too late: it has about six zillion reviews on Amazon (mostly raves -- go figure that one out).
I am reading "The Age of Miracles." It has a scene with whales beaching themselves. It was like a flashback to this book, and I shivered in horror.
note to self: do not read "The Age of Miracles".
I read this so many years ago I dont even remember the story but I remember that I liked it. I was 17 at the time but seeing all this hatred for it makes me want to read it again to see what the fuss is about. I dont understand how anyone can be so passionately disgusted by a book. its just a book. wanna ready a sucky ass story with no real point and so many holes in the plot you can see through it? Try The Pact by Jodi Picoult. Now thats an author I will never try again. Still dont completely hate it though because I havent the energy.
Um. It doesn't exactly take a lot of energy to dislike a book. You sit, you read, you hate. Pretty low-key, by my lights. Hell, your comment is nearly as long as my review, so if that's your standard, seems to me your energy levels are through the roof.
I personally love this book .. the repeated comments about how many bad things can happen to this girl blah blah blah... sorry not every Novel has a happy ending although a bit extreme with some situations this is the sort of chaotic downward spiral that happens with trauma.. not always or with everyone but he was trying to capture a girl with serious mental illness and trauma on top of it. it isnt supposed to be a pretty fairy tale
Best review on GR. So nice to see someone with a simliar view on this p.o.s "novel".
Best review on GR. So nice to see someone with a simliar view on this p.o.s "novel".
I read this based on the good blurbs about it about 9 years ago...it took me forever to slog through and the whole reason I did was because of the good reviews...just waiting for the plot to get good...and it never did. After Dolores killed the fish I couldn't even stand her anymore. And the stuff with Dante was just weird. The most baffling things about the good review blurbs on the back were the insistence that a. This book was funny, and b. Lamb knew how to write about the "female experience." (What, there's only one?) Here's a few male authors who are SO much better at writing women than Lamb: Manil Suri (The City of Devi). Silas House (A Parchment of Leaves). Leo Tolstoy (Anna Karenina). Victor Hugo (Les Miserables). Kazuo Ishiguro (Never Let Me Go and A Pale View of Hills). Ian McEwan (Atonement). Lamb...no.
Disagree that Les Miserables was a better account of the female experience than She's Come Undone. And to the person who said, "How many bad things can happen to one person?" Seriously?
I read reviews because they sometimes make me laugh-like yours. For some reason, my feed says I've read this book but I have not, nor do I now intend to do so.
This review made me laugh so hard. Only sorry that you missed mentioning the earworm-inducing title...but it's not TOO LATE (too laaayyyyaaaayyyyaaaaayyyyaaatuh) for me to do it here:She's come undone
She didn't know what she was headed for
And when I found what she was headed for
It was too late
Just another reason (at least for me) for hating on this book. Plus the jacket art. Maybe that last point is unfair as often outside the author's control, but the whole package makes me cringe.
NO GUESS WHO ON MY REVIEW PAGE!!!!(But it made me laugh, too, I must admit.)
I hated it.I thought i was the only one.Never again!
Dear, dear Akosua, you will never be alone in disdain of Lamb!!
I believe that you're getting flagged as spoilers because you mention the rape and that's a major plot point not revealed until at least midway and not on the book flap at all. I appreciate your disdain although I disagree but please don't ruin it for others.
I just finished reading the book and could not disagree more. It was a well-written, raw portrayal of the way we are sometimes our own worst enemies.
Bradley wrote: "I believe that you're getting flagged as spoilers because you mention the rape and that's a major plot point not revealed until at least midway and not on the book flap at all. I appreciate your di..."The rape happens WAY before the midpoint of the book. Sorry, but I'm not of the school that revealing one incident that occurs in the first few pages of a book constitutes a spoiler that has to be tagged. There are 400-some pages to go after that; if my revealing one plot point early on ruins the entire book for you, then I don't know what to tell you.
I read this book quite some time ago for my book club and didn't hate it or love it, but we had so darn much fun talking about it at our get-together that I ended up giving it three stars just for the enjoyment of our discussion. For many meetings afterwards, it was brought up on many occasions for one reason or another for another round of laughs. I really do believe Lamb wrote this "tongue in cheek."
My book club has a book like that too: "On Elegance While Sleeping." We all hated it, but it's been good for laughs for around three years now.
Laura wrote: "My book club has a book like that too: "On Elegance While Sleeping." We all hated it, but it's been good for laughs for around three years now."I'll have to check this one out!! Never too many laughs!!
This review --and its comments -- have been such a source of delight for me over the years. So nice to have it pop back up in my feed! (Recommended For: Masochists.)
I read it at work one summer. I found it depressing; however, I devoured because I recognized places in my hometown and surrounding area.
yes many of your comments are spoilers and it wouldn't have taken very much effort to indicate that in your review. If fact, probably far less effort than replying with all of your defensive comments every time someone disagrees with you. I am in the middle of this book and there were several things I wouldn't have liked to have read in your review prior to finishing it, if I had chosen to.
