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Title: Disappointed
Review: After reading Stein's how-to books on writing, I was impressed. However, after reading his novel, The Magician, I was left scratching my head. Several of the opening pages are nothing but narrative, boring narrative, at best. There was no "starting the story in the middle of something," as suggested in his how-to books. Just a long droll through an old town with snow and ice and a setting of meloncholy. Once inside the story I didn't get a sense of adversarial dialogue as Stein suggests that all beginning writers to do.The story was technically good but---and maybe it has something to do with its time period---I found its diction disappointingly ironic from such a brilliant teacher on writing.To be fair, I'll try reading more of his fiction work.
