Books I Didn’t Finish On Vacation

Not everything I read while I was on the beach was fantastic, or even worth finishing. I was disappointed, because they all looked good.
On the plus side, this is a very short list.

• A Spy by Nature
  - Alan Cumming.   I really wanted this one to work. MI5, a new spy learning the ropes, slick parties and British espionage. I wanted “Spooks” in book form. What I got, was a ponderous, first person narrative about shady business dealings, industrial espionage, and whining about personal twentysomething rootlessness. So I didn’t read more than a few chapters. The prose was well written, I’ll say that. Dad read the whole thing, and confirmed that it was slow going, even though the prose was well constructed, the narrative, and his interest, flagged. Which is a shame, because the premise looked so good.
• A Death in Vienna

- Frank Tallis. This one looked promising because I love a good 19th century mystery. And I considered shades of evolving Freudian psychology a bonus. Neither Dad nor I could get through more than a few chapters of this one, though. Dad said it best. “30 pages in, there’s a body, and I know more about Viennese desserts than I ever wanted to. But not much action.” Again, seduced by back flap copy, to find the novel itself resoundingly meh.