Title: Lucky Bastard
Author: SG Browne
Star Rating: 2 out of 5
Buy, Borrow, Skip: Skip
Bonus: Yeah, I got nothing.
So this is it: the last of the crap paperbacks I bought to read at the pool/lake/whatever this summer. After this it's all literature. Really.
Lucky Bastard is an alternative reality novel in which luck--good or bad--can be stolen by certain individuals born with the knack to poach it from a handshake alone. Nick Monday is such a luck poacher. He poses as a PI to make a little money on the side while he scopes out lottery winners, car crash survivors, and those with that innate charisma that comes with natural good luck. One handshake and he can change their fortunes. (And make a hefty profit on the black market.)
Browne has a great dry sense of humor that really appealed to me, and the premise sounded fun, too. The perfect beach read, right? In the end though, it seemed like Browne was more interested in writing a travelogue of San Francisco than an actual novel. Each paragraph is of the "He started off down Lombard Street before heading down Whichever Avenue" (or whatever the actual street are) variety, and while at first it was fun since I know San Francisco a bit, after a while it just became tedious. There was also A LOT going on. There were something like four different storylines that I expected to intersect but never did. They were all exciting on their own, but none of them were able to come to fruition with everything else going on.
Definitely one to pass on.
Author: SG Browne
Star Rating: 2 out of 5
Buy, Borrow, Skip: Skip
Bonus: Yeah, I got nothing.
So this is it: the last of the crap paperbacks I bought to read at the pool/lake/whatever this summer. After this it's all literature. Really.
Lucky Bastard is an alternative reality novel in which luck--good or bad--can be stolen by certain individuals born with the knack to poach it from a handshake alone. Nick Monday is such a luck poacher. He poses as a PI to make a little money on the side while he scopes out lottery winners, car crash survivors, and those with that innate charisma that comes with natural good luck. One handshake and he can change their fortunes. (And make a hefty profit on the black market.)
Browne has a great dry sense of humor that really appealed to me, and the premise sounded fun, too. The perfect beach read, right? In the end though, it seemed like Browne was more interested in writing a travelogue of San Francisco than an actual novel. Each paragraph is of the "He started off down Lombard Street before heading down Whichever Avenue" (or whatever the actual street are) variety, and while at first it was fun since I know San Francisco a bit, after a while it just became tedious. There was also A LOT going on. There were something like four different storylines that I expected to intersect but never did. They were all exciting on their own, but none of them were able to come to fruition with everything else going on.
Definitely one to pass on.