The Grouchy Editor

by Katherine Boo

Katherine Boo’s Behind the Beautiful Forevers is in many ways an astonishing piece of work.  Yet it’s also the type of “nonfiction” narrative that triggers nagging doubts (thanks a lot, James Frey).

The good.  Boo spent three years recording the lives of slum-dwellers at Annawadi, a squalid settlement adjacent to fancy tourist hotels and Mumbai’s international airport.  Boo avoids sentiment and, in depicting a world so harsh, unforgiving, and corrupt, has no need to embellish the facts.  (But does she?  See below.)  She uncovers a small slice of poverty and in the process sheds volumes of light on income inequality in India.

The suspect.  Imagine this:  A group of male street-toughs, all of them teenage thieves or scavengers, are gathered on a corner.  They discuss the sort of things that young boys discuss:  girls, music, movies.  They spot a white woman who is middle-aged, well-educated, privileged – and American.  “Hey lady,” say the boys, “come join us and we’ll share our secrets and dreams with you, and treat you like just one of the guys.”  See the problem?  And yet Boo manages to probe the innermost thoughts and dreams of these kids.  Great journalism, or creative license?

In an author’s note, Boo proffers a fairly convincing explanation of the techniques she used to get Indians like those boys to open up.   In a separate interview, Boo calls narrative nonfiction “a selective art.”  That leaves the reader with a choice:  buy into the reporter’s “selective art” … or not.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

by Elmore Leonard

When it comes to crime fiction, there seem to be two types of consumers:  fans who want Martin Scorsese to keep making mob movies until the day he swims with the fishes, and who gobble up books like Elmore Leonard’s “tough-guy” novels; and people who enjoy a good gangster story – but only to a certain point.  There’s no question that Leonard is a skilled writer, especially with pacing, but a little bit of his clichéd bad-guys routine goes a long way with me.  I don’t automatically smile because the hero has a Brooklyn accent, and I’m not on tenterhooks because the characters carry guns. 

And Leonard’s female characters?  The main woman in Get Shorty is thinly drawn and exists primarily to lust after our “cool” hero, a loan shark who goes Hollywood and who barely has to lift a finger to attract her and (the few) other women in the story.  But if you love this tough-guy stuff, well, then this is a book for you.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

 by Janet Evanovich

These Stephanie Plum novels are like mom’s meatloaf:   The ingredients never change, but they still taste good on occasion.  The only news from this 17th installment in the series is that “good girl” Stephanie finally stops fantasizing about cheating on longtime boyfriend Morelli – and goes ahead and does it.  Several times.  Morelli, supposedly an ace cop, either suspects nothing or doesn’t care.  Problem is, if he doesn’t care, why should readers?

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

by Philip Coppens

I’ll admit it, this stuff fascinates me:  rocks weighing hundreds of tons that our ancestors were somehow able to move; cryptic references to “gods from the heavens” found in many ancient manuscripts; science’s acknowledgment that there is likely life out there in the universe.  So when I pick up a book like Coppens’s The Ancient Alien Question, I try to have an open mind.  But then ….

There are so many problems with this book.  For starters, it should be called The English Language Question.  I don’t know if it was poorly translated, edited, or written, but much of it is incomprehensible, crammed with irrelevant (at least to the layman) details about disputes within the scientific community, or dull minutiae, such as the components of old cement.  Coppens’s favorite adverb is “clearly,” but there is very little I’d consider “clear” about many of his conclusions.

Consider this example:  On page 202, Coppens cites “evidence” that nuclear technology existed in ancient India by quoting an expert named Francis Taylor.  On the following page, Coppens writes this:  “The first question is whether the named archaeologist Francis Taylor existed.  Alas, no one has ever been able to identify him.”  In an attempt to confer an air of impartiality and credibility to the author, the publisher’s blurb claims that Coppens is “labeled a skeptic by the believers, and a believer by the skeptics.”  Don’t buy it:  The man is “clearly” a believer.

It’s too bad this book is such a mess, because there are a lot of mysteries from antiquity, and it seems unlikely that humans could have accomplished some of their amazing feats without help – from someone or something.  There must be better books on this subject.  Clearly.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)

by Susan Faludi

As I read Susan Faludi’s (Backlash) depressing opus about the “crisis” in American manhood, I kept changing my opinion of its author.  At times I wanted to laud Faludi for her insightful reporting – and sometimes I wanted to throttle her for general cluelessness.  As a former journalist, I appreciate the sheer amount of legwork that went into her book.  She interviewed scores of men, from construction workers to porn stars, and much of her analysis is thoughtful.   But occasionally Faludi adopts the tone of a victor perched atop the pedestal of feminism, sitting subtly and condescendingly in judgment of pitiful males.

Random thoughts: 

• Faludi’s conclusion is that most American men are unhappy (and resistant to feminism) because their fathers – those heroes of World War II and members of the “greatest generation” – were cold, distant, and silent parents, providing little or no guidance to boys growing up in a consumer culture that rewards image over true worth.  I’m sure there is some truth to this theory.  But what about all of the mothers – do they make no impact on their sons?  Other than in passing, Faludi makes no mention of the mothers.
• Feminism, like motherhood, gets a pass from Faludi as a contributing factor to modern male distress.  Men who criticize any aspect of the women’s movement are unreasonable, delusional, or scapegoating.  Yet I was struck by this assessment of feminism by one of the men Faludi interviewed:  “It doesn’t seem to have made anyone very happy.”
• I’m not convinced that the average American male is quite as tormented as Faludi would have us believe.  But a 600-page volume of interviews with men who are generally content would be an awfully dull read.
• Faludi’s final words of advice to men who are unhappy or confused by our Brave New World?  “Wage a battle against no enemy.”  Great.  That helps.

© 2010-2026 grouchyeditor.com (text only)