Review by ASiegelster -- You, The People by Pablo Digenio
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ASiegelster
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- Latest Review: You, The People by Pablo Digenio
Review by ASiegelster -- You, The People by Pablo Digenio
[Following is a volunteer review of "You, The People" by Pablo Digenio.]
1 out of 4 stars
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You, The People by Pablo Digenio is a series of six short stories, all with the same theme: the protagonist (usually a pretty terrible human being) gets retribution by the end of the story. The idea is very intriguing. The execution, however, is really quite terrible. The following are the reasons as to why I gave this book 1 out of 4 stars.
Before getting into the meat of Digenio’s stories, I would like to address the poor editing done on this book by Cecilia Camps. The grammar is very poor, with run-on sentences galore, and certainly not enough use of the colon. There are numerous spelling mistakes, including the one bolded in this sentence from the first story “Do It Yourself”: “Still, Rebecca faired on the side of caution and gently picked up the box – it was quite heavy.” This word should be “fared”. If it were indeed supposed to be “faired”, it would mean Rebecca was becoming milder (this definition is normally only used for the weather). If Digenio wants to have this book be successful, the first major step is to check his own spelling and grammar, and to hire a better editor.
Digenio’s own style needs improvement. Not only is he fond of using run-on sentences, but he is also fond of using cliches every other sentence. Now, I don’t mind a good cliche, but when one uses them exclusively then it becomes a problem. With so many cliches the story lacks original style and creativity.
Each story is written in third person, the perspective being the protagonist’s. This is absolutely fine, however there are points in his writing where Digenio will break the flow of the narration to give a side remark to the reader. I would not normally mind this, but this doesn’t make sense here. If it was the narrator’s perspective, then an aside to the reader would make sense. Here it simply breaks the flow of the story. Sometimes Digenio even transfers the perspective onto a supporting character, which is even worse for the flow of the story.
There is also the problem of using words incorrectly. For example is the use of the word “aseptic” when “ascetic” would have been more appropriate. I highly doubt a word meaning “free from contamination caused by harmful bacteria, viruses, or other microorganisms”(definition taken from the Google dictionary) would be used to describe someone’s minimalist home. Digenio wanted to use this word to compare the living space with the protagonist’s personality, but I would also not use “aseptic” to describe someone.
A thing which an author should never do often is use onomatopoeic words to describe sounds. Digenio does just this. For describing the sound of music, he likes to put in the text “♪laa, la la laa, lalalalala la laa ♫”. For the sounds of guns or slamming doors he simply puts “BANG”. For an author who uses so much (indeed too much) descriptive language, it is astounding that he would save the least amount of description for something that needs the most description.
Overall the style needs vast improvement.
What was most disappointing to me was the plot and flow of each story. The premise for each, as I said briefly above, is that the protagonist, usually a less than agreeable person, goes through a series of trials, which in the end earn the protagonist retribution for some wrong they committed. Again, the idea is intriguing. It seems that for each protagonist their retribution is supposed to come in the form of some supernatural entity, be it demonic or technological. Often, though, Digenio does not follow through with this and either gives the story a completely random ending irrelevant to the main plot, or gives no indication of retribution until the end and has to explain it to the reader rather than inserting it cleverly into the plot. In the third story, which I will come back to later, the protagonist is supposed to get punished for murdering prostitutes in order to take out his anger on his unfaithful wife. In the end, instead of being killed by a prostitute possessed by the ghost of his wife, the prostitute/wife turns out to be a spider who feeds on the protagonist. Talk about randomness.
My last point will be on a particular story, and will perhaps be my harshest criticism. The third story, “Number Thirteen”, read like some story a guy who never got a date and who hates women would write after having seen an episode of CSI. There is no point to the story, only to perhaps tell the insecurities of the author himself. I felt very uncomfortable reading this story, and I have no doubt it would make other readers, especially women, feel the same.
I would not recommend this book be read by anyone until some more work has been put into it, and it has been revised like mad.
******
You, The People
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
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1 out of 4 stars
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You, The People by Pablo Digenio is a series of six short stories, all with the same theme: the protagonist (usually a pretty terrible human being) gets retribution by the end of the story. The idea is very intriguing. The execution, however, is really quite terrible. The following are the reasons as to why I gave this book 1 out of 4 stars.
Before getting into the meat of Digenio’s stories, I would like to address the poor editing done on this book by Cecilia Camps. The grammar is very poor, with run-on sentences galore, and certainly not enough use of the colon. There are numerous spelling mistakes, including the one bolded in this sentence from the first story “Do It Yourself”: “Still, Rebecca faired on the side of caution and gently picked up the box – it was quite heavy.” This word should be “fared”. If it were indeed supposed to be “faired”, it would mean Rebecca was becoming milder (this definition is normally only used for the weather). If Digenio wants to have this book be successful, the first major step is to check his own spelling and grammar, and to hire a better editor.
Digenio’s own style needs improvement. Not only is he fond of using run-on sentences, but he is also fond of using cliches every other sentence. Now, I don’t mind a good cliche, but when one uses them exclusively then it becomes a problem. With so many cliches the story lacks original style and creativity.
Each story is written in third person, the perspective being the protagonist’s. This is absolutely fine, however there are points in his writing where Digenio will break the flow of the narration to give a side remark to the reader. I would not normally mind this, but this doesn’t make sense here. If it was the narrator’s perspective, then an aside to the reader would make sense. Here it simply breaks the flow of the story. Sometimes Digenio even transfers the perspective onto a supporting character, which is even worse for the flow of the story.
There is also the problem of using words incorrectly. For example is the use of the word “aseptic” when “ascetic” would have been more appropriate. I highly doubt a word meaning “free from contamination caused by harmful bacteria, viruses, or other microorganisms”(definition taken from the Google dictionary) would be used to describe someone’s minimalist home. Digenio wanted to use this word to compare the living space with the protagonist’s personality, but I would also not use “aseptic” to describe someone.
A thing which an author should never do often is use onomatopoeic words to describe sounds. Digenio does just this. For describing the sound of music, he likes to put in the text “♪laa, la la laa, lalalalala la laa ♫”. For the sounds of guns or slamming doors he simply puts “BANG”. For an author who uses so much (indeed too much) descriptive language, it is astounding that he would save the least amount of description for something that needs the most description.
Overall the style needs vast improvement.
What was most disappointing to me was the plot and flow of each story. The premise for each, as I said briefly above, is that the protagonist, usually a less than agreeable person, goes through a series of trials, which in the end earn the protagonist retribution for some wrong they committed. Again, the idea is intriguing. It seems that for each protagonist their retribution is supposed to come in the form of some supernatural entity, be it demonic or technological. Often, though, Digenio does not follow through with this and either gives the story a completely random ending irrelevant to the main plot, or gives no indication of retribution until the end and has to explain it to the reader rather than inserting it cleverly into the plot. In the third story, which I will come back to later, the protagonist is supposed to get punished for murdering prostitutes in order to take out his anger on his unfaithful wife. In the end, instead of being killed by a prostitute possessed by the ghost of his wife, the prostitute/wife turns out to be a spider who feeds on the protagonist. Talk about randomness.
My last point will be on a particular story, and will perhaps be my harshest criticism. The third story, “Number Thirteen”, read like some story a guy who never got a date and who hates women would write after having seen an episode of CSI. There is no point to the story, only to perhaps tell the insecurities of the author himself. I felt very uncomfortable reading this story, and I have no doubt it would make other readers, especially women, feel the same.
I would not recommend this book be read by anyone until some more work has been put into it, and it has been revised like mad.
******
You, The People
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
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Latest Review: You, The People by Pablo Digenio
