Less by Andrew Sean Greer

10 of us Zoomed in to discuss Less by Andrew Sean Greer – with so many of us joining the conversation was lively and it took a little while to settle down and focus on our reading experiences.

The opening comment: “Is there a reason why we are holding off talking about this book?” was met with nods and chuckles of agreement. “Indeed” said another, “I’ll never get that time back!”.

This was followed by “it was boring” and “I was waiting for something to happen”.

But then: “It was better than I thought … my expectations were low.”

More laughter! None of us could understand the comments on the book cover: ‘You will sob with tears of joy’, ‘Marvellously, endearingly, unexpectedly funny.’ ‘A fast and rocketing read’. Really?  We just couldn’t agree with them. We can only think that it's funnier if you are American. 

In fact, she who selected this book as a prospective read said she had researched books to make you laugh out loud.  She (and we) wonder how on earth this book got onto such a list!

This is a very visual book, there are lots going on and the writing is quite good BUT there is no plot. Yes, we liked the writing but not the story.

It is not laugh out loud funny, it’s sad: an aging man feeling sorry for himself. It was nonsense but in the sense that it was not sensible.

Then. A flicker of light. “Don’t dismiss as complete crap – it’s a dodgy plot but interesting.”

OK, let’s consider that…

Was there meant to be a parallel between this book and the book that Less authors in the story?

We enjoyed the German language – that was funny (but not laugh out loud funny).

It took me a while to get into it (the book) and some bits were better than others. It was as if the author really enjoyed writing some parts but not others.

We did learn how to pronounce ‘Pew-litzer’ who knew?! This book won the prize – how?

None of us could say we would read another book by this author.

Would we recommend this book? No, but we wouldn’t say it is rubbish, just not what we expected.

We have read worse but we’ve read better – here our focus on Less was gone. We moved on to better books we have read and enjoyed. Oh, and Only Fools and Horses.

We then spent some quality time discussing other books we had enjoyed over the Summer:

Bagehot: The Life and Times of the Greatest Victorian – don’t buy it, it’s really boring!

A novel in Spanish (I can’t remember the title) – was ridiculously hard!

The 19^th Wife – I’m tempted to put it on our list for next read.

Snowdrops by AD Miller

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn

The Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

The Standing Pool by Adam Thorpe.

Ordinary People by Diana Evans

I finished A Sting in the Tale (previous read)

The Rosie Project by Graham Simsion

Bill Bryson books!

A wonderful evening of books, that’s what book group is all about. See you all next time:

Our next book is Three Stories by Alan Bennett. We will chat about our reading at 8pm on 5^th November – probably, well almost certainly, by Zoom.