Berengaria’s Reviews > Demon Copperhead > Status Update
Berengaria
is on page 100 of 546
While I love Demon's narrative voice, none of the reviews mentioned it is told in exactly the same style as 19th century literature. I don't get along well with older lit, so perhaps I won't finish this one.
But being from VA, I love this quote: "Southwest Virginia, we're just one damn thing after another"
— Nov 07, 2025 07:03PM
But being from VA, I love this quote: "Southwest Virginia, we're just one damn thing after another"
17 likes · Like flag
Berengaria’s Previous Updates
Berengaria
is on page 354 of 546
Much better now and I do want to know what's going to happen to Demon, but the story's structured a lot like real life...that is, largely plotless and full of the damnedest twists of fate and coincidences, which is very unlike fiction. I suppose that's the 19th cent "serial" structure showing through.
— Nov 08, 2025 09:29PM
Comments Showing 1-7 of 7 (7 new)
date
newest »
newest »
message 1:
by
Alan (on December semi-hiatus)
(new)
-
rated it 5 stars
Nov 07, 2025 07:14PM
Anything 19th century went completely over my head, but as we've discussed in the past I bond with books for emotional and/or personal attachment reasons and the writing style is of little consideration. A shame if you dnf, but so it goes. 😢
reply
|
flag
Maybe the plethora of cuss words distracted reviewers from that point. 😄 Seriously though, I didn't feel the similarity of style. It's faithful to David Copperfield in plot throughout, but the writing was much more accessible in this one, even when it rambled excessively. I even read the two books back to back to get the overlap properly.
Well spotted Berengaria and sad it doesn't jive with you. I thought that was a part of the Copperfield comparisons. Maybe a little too clever for its own good- I might agree with you on that.
Rosh ~catching up slowly~ wrote: "Maybe the plethora of cuss words distracted reviewers from that point. 😄 Seriously though, I didn't feel the similarity of style. It's faithful to David Copperfield in plot throughout, but the writ..."Yes, the language is modern and therefore more accessible, thank goodness. I don't mean the linguistic style, but that it's "I was born, I grew up, I became a man, etc etc" which is a very old way to tell a story.
AND there is far more tell than show. Demon tells us what happens, he doesn't show us. That's also very "old lit". We don't generally tell stories that way today, starting with birth and slowly moving forward in time. That's what I mean. A retelling, even with the same plot, could have been arranged in a more modern style.
Good on you for having read both! I haven't read DC and don't know the story, so it's all new for me.
And I don't mind the cussing, as I do it myself, damn it. That's totally normal for Virginians. 😉
This moon-walking possum told you so! I was the only one who didn’t like this in book club. Though I never said 19th C. Go the DNF.
Sportyrod wrote: "This moon-walking possum told you so! I was the only one who didn’t like this in book club. Though I never said 19th C. Go the DNF."I'm going to stick with it ...for now. I do enjoy books that talk about farming and really bad social situations. (Just please a modern style!)
Well at least we can compared notes after completion. But don’t expect it to be good!
