2 out of 4 stars
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The book includes 19 short stories which I can divide them to 3 categories:
• The fantasy stories
• The stories based on writer’s experiences as probation officer
• The stories which happened in Australia
In the first category, we will find two stories, “A Second Less Capable Head” and “The Guest”.
Hanna let his imagination go deep in writing these stories. In the first one, the idea was unique and fresh, the dialogues were very natural and efficient. Though, in the middle of story we could guess what will happen at the end, but still it was not a boring story to finish it with smile. The second story of the book and of this genre, “The Guest”, was even better. Very good and new idea, great ending and very much attractive till end!
In the second category, Hanna made a character, “Mr. Hemming” who is a probation officer. He is the person who tells us his experiences in most of the stories. Unfortunately, some of the stories like “Cheating the Jail out of time”, “Another will take your place”,”The Body in the Bay”, were like reports or just a probation officer remembering his memories, without any ups and down or any mysteries! But I found the best story of this book in this category, which was “Honey Bunny”. Great narrator! Hanna wrote a stalker, from stalker’s point of view, which made the story special and very much attractive to read. Hanna’s experience as probation officer, gave him good knowledge of criminals and mentally ill people. And he used it very well to make a realistic, believable character in his stories.
The last category was the worst one, in my point of view. The stories were dull and without any specific story lines.
Some of other positive points that i found in A Second Less Capable Head are:
• He used very big variety of words, which make the stories easy and more attractive to continue.
• Because of strong characterization, even though the decisions and actions of some of the characters were strange and very much odd, they were believable and very funny!
• Familiarity of the street language and criminal minds gave deeper layer to his stories.
• Choosing not very common points of view for his stories makes them technically strong.
• The sense of humor in his stories is a good reason to read this book!
I rate this book 2 out of 4 stars. Because out of 19 short stories, I believe only 6 stories were good!
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A Second, Less Capable Head
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