Anita Shreve

A Novel

Body Surfing

Lauren Grey

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Anita Shreve has fairly good reviews on her books and her name came up when I googled similar authors to Jodi Picoult. I can say that this book was nothing in comparison to a Picoult novel. I did not like it and will most likely not read another book by Shreve by choice. It was short, which isn’t that big of a deal, but I felt the characters were not well-developed, nor was the story. I wasn’t really sure she knew where she wanted to it go. The end was ambiguous and ridiculous.

After reading the snyopsis, I liked the whole idea of two brothers “battling” if you will over one girl for a summer while she lives with them and tutors their sister. The synopsis honestly described the first 50 pages, but the rest had nothing to do with it. The story took a turn and just went off the deep end. The brothers did not really “vie for her affections”… they go night surfing together (all three of them), then after that the oldest brother just backs off and the younger brother starts a relationship with her. Honestly it was plain stupid.

Another thing that bothered me was Shreve’s writing style. I wasn’t used to it, but the overuse of paragraphs was really messing with my head. After two sentences, she would begin a new paragraph. At one point there were five paragraphs on one page. That might not bother some people, but it really bugged me.

The characters had the most shallow and pointless conversations. Nothing meaningful or profound was ever said. I can’t even be sure what the plot or outcome of the story really was. I couldn’t really relate to the characters, but I didn’t feel for them either. The main character Sydney; I don’t know how I felt about her……

I would not recommend this book.

Body Surfing A Novel

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