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Title: Overrated But Interesting
Review: This first novel has gotten a lot of hype - an article in the New York Times, a few scattered reviews here and there, comparing Mr. Schytegart to everybody from Salman Rushie, Saul Bellow to (egads!) Nabokov. For all that, I was disappointed in this novel. It's not as good as Nabokov! The main character, Girshkin is not that sympathetic, his female characters are thin and unconvincing, and his adventures are interesting but never really engaging. True, there are funny moments in the novel, but it's not the type of book that would force me to drop everything until I finished it. What I mean is, there are parts that are brillant, parts that are boring, and parts that are OK. So you see it's a mixed bag. I don't regret reading it, but I don't think I would have missed "the next Nabokov" if I hadn't, either. However, I look forward to seeing this author's future work.
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