Susieq777

Geez, I dunno. What am I missing?

I think this is possibly the first time I have ever been bamboozled and swept off a book's trail by its foreword.

Coming to this book knowing nothing about Madeleine St John, I decided to read the foreword written by the film director, Bruce Beresford, who was Madeleine's class compatriot at Sydney University in the early 1960's.

I became interested in the author herself - who was this difficult woman whose tastes went in all directions - Christianity, Buffy the Vampire Slayer - and what was it about her and her past which made her so quick to cut off friends and family who did her wrong?

Leaving the forward then I was descended into a pile of fluff, from which I somehow just couldn't find myself being able to muster up the energy to care enough about any of these characters. Reviews by others have left me a little bewildered. While Hilary Mantel found it a "pocket masterpiece," and Lee Tulloch devoured it in one sitting as a "delicious meringue" and Bruce Beresford thought it a "comic masterpiece", I found it a sort of sweet silhouette of the Sydney of that time but ultimately, really didn't care all that much.

Sigh. What am I missing?

Maybe I just need to lighten the hell up :)