Title: Tedious book by a megalomaniac
Product review: Many books are infected with a common malady -- I'll call it the "look-how-funny-I-am" virus. Seen in both fiction and nonfiction, the chief symptom of this disease is that the writer exaggerates events or anecdotes to the point of incredulity. The reader invariably finds himself saying, "I don't believe you!" Now, writers often employ exaggeration to heighten comic effect. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with this. Used sparingly, exaggeration can be very entertaining. But when this exaggeration is employed in every other passage, as in this memoir by Dave Eggers, or as in the fiction of Tom Robbins, the effect is not comic. The effect is inauthentic and tedious.The reading public's apparent infatuation with this mediocrity is a sad measure of contemporary taste.
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