Book Review by JG

Freycinet, Melanie Calvert, 2012

Well it had to happen – I've read great books over the years (that makes me sound old, doesn't it?) but the time has come – I was trying to be nice and just call this one of the worst books I've ever read, but no – the awful truth is that it's the worst.

The title caught my eye because it is about Freycinet National Park in Tasmania. However, despite the initial promise of a good story, it didn't hold me transfixed and eager to keep reading like so many other books I've read. I ‘drifted off’ many times, thinking about other things, and had to make an effort to pull myself back and keep reading. Good writing, I've been told, ‘shows, doesn’t tell’.  To paraphrase Elmore Leonard, good writing doesn't sound like writing. Calvert’s descriptions seem to be focused on telling, not showing, and the excessive use of adjectives is annoying - ‘a screeching clatter of birds suddenly flails close to my head’(p47); ‘The track leads us past breathtaking, twisted trees, profuse scrub, and immense stones by other hikers who seem similarly chastened and unnaturally hushed, and past the bones and dried bloody remnants and rich charcoal smells of something dead’(p36); ‘Inside, I step onto polished floor-boards that reflect the green-golden light…The furniture is made of golden-toned wood, and the curtains are a mottled orange and green.’(p18). I only found one cliché (but I didn’t finish the book!) – ‘He’s devastatingly handsome.’(p42). I don't remember what this refers to, but ‘Their colours, in shades from a greenish salmon pink to a raw red tinged with blue, are surreal and alarming, jarring against the brilliant sky.’(p10). In this instance the adjectives are applicable - it is definitely alarming and jarring. I cannot find a publisher’s name on the book, so I think it's self-published. The book has had many good reviews, but I think it’s one of the silliest books I’ve ever (partially) read.  Just in case I felt I wasn't learning anything, I came across the word 'discombobulating'. I've never seen that word in print anywhere, not in anything by Plato, Jean-Paul Sartre, or even Immanuel Kant! Someone told me it means confusing - did Calvert's editor completely miss the irony? Needless to say, I can't speak for other readers, but I read novels for relaxation, escape, entertainment - I don't expect to require assistance from the complete Oxford!