Beginner’s Greek by James Collins
Prior to picking up “Beginner’s Greek”, I had hit a dry spell with reading. I had gotten caught up with life, and whatever free time I had was spent on the computer…not curled up with a book. Wanting to remedy the situation, and not finding the motivation on my bookshelves, I decided a trip to the library was in order.
“Beginner’s Greek” was one of the first books I picked up, when I read the dust jacket to find that it was a book about love and fate, I thought that I’d give it a shot. Since I had read so many “chick novels” along the same lines, I thought it would be refreshing to read a book written by the male species.
I got home and as time was a bit limited, I only had the chance to read the prologue. It seemed to set the story up pretty well, and so I looked forward to returning to it when time permits. However, when I returned to the story I found myself throughly disappointed by probably the two biggest flaws a writer could fall into. Poor characterizations and a poor story line.
I could deal with one or the other. There has been plenty of books in which I wasn’t a huge fan of the characters yet, the story line was intriguing or funny and I have read some books in which I have loved the characters, despite thinking the story line was completely lacking. However, when you put the two elements together…it makes for an extremely trying experience.
Collin’s characters are static and just TOO. They are too good. They are too much of a jerk. They are too grating. And overall, they are too boring. The moment they are introduced, you know everything about them and it’s very easy to see how they will fit into the story line. Even if you have had the most rudimentary training in characterization in this subject, you know that it’s important for characters to change somewhat in the course of a story. Sadly, Collin’s must have slept through that literature class.
The story line might have been okay, however, it just seemed as though the elements of the story fell into place too easily, it was a story line that might have been appropriate for middle school age in it’s complexity, but for an adult it was just too simple to make for an interesting plot.
I did however like the premise of the novel. I like thinking that perhaps two sole mates start out as seat mates on a plane. I like believing in fate, and that even poorly written books can remind me that sometimes fate does play a part in what happens in your life.
