I keep promising myself that when I don't like a book, I'll just put it down and not endure another two or three hundred pages out of the misplaced notion that since I've started it I must finish it.  Have I kept my promise to myself? Not often enough! Case in point: Joyland by Emily Schultz, a 2006 novel by the writer who more recently penned Heaven Is Small.  


Schultz knows how to write a good, descriptive sentence, I can't deny it, but I am becoming increasingly weary of what seems to be a growing trend in the Canadian novels and short stories I've been reading . . . focusing on the seedier/nastier/darker side of 'reality' but focusing on it in such a way as to bring nothing new to the conversation. It reads like mere observation, albeit well-worded observation.  And I think a good work of words should do more than that, ultimately.   


I admit, it's unusual for me to write a negative review, but I suppose I'm suffering from that terrible reader's affliction, thwarted expectations. Joyland promised me much and delivered little. I was looking forward to a story about two siblings (Chris and Tammy) in a small Ontario town who undergo a life-altering summer. Add in the 1980s pop culture references, teenage Chris's obsession with arcade games, eleven year old Tammy's compulsion to be a spy . . . how could it go wrong?  [While immediate comparisons with Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird might have occurred (two young siblings undergo life-altering events in a small town), I brushed away the inevitable 'but-it's-been-done-before' thoughts and hoped for the best (that the setting wasn't just a gimmick to retell a better-told tale).] 


As I progressed further into the story, however, it struck me as something of an empty read. It was all described very graphically (Chris' growing interest in a female fellow gamer, Tammy's eleven-year-old confusions over issues like sex, marriage failure, high school dating), but I felt I'd read and seen similar characters and situations so many times before (it was especially reminiscent of many a John Hughes film, just told a bit grittier and, honestly, not nearly as well). And unlike Lee's classic-for-a-reason novel (and most Hughes films, for that matter), Joyland doesn't have much to offer in the way of insight into the human condition. In a nutshell: these characters and their problems didn't come alive for me.


Have I learned my lesson? Will I put down the next book that fails to capture my imagination and respect?  I hope so . . . I've just started Winder's The Final Act of Mr. Shakespeare and must admit to feeling a bit dubious about the wisdom of continuing . . . But maybe it'll get better later on (and here we go again . . . :)