Bohemian Gospel - A Ride to Nowhere

Bohemian Gospel by Dana Chamblee Carpenter

What to say about this book?  I read the review as part of my job, and there was an interesting premise to it.  There is a girl who heals a king - she has some kind of powers.  He asks her to travel with him in case anything else should happen to him - she can heal him.  Then they fall in love.


Mouse, the girl, somehow appealed to me.  I thought the story would have more to do with her journey from insecurity, obscurity, and immaturity into having a place in the world.  But this book is more concerned with the supernatural aspect of her powers.  It follows the implications of what she becomes capable of to some drastic ends - until Mouse is living alone in the woods for decades with only a wolf for company.  It kind of defied belief that that would happen - and it became a story about the burdens of power, the loneliness of being different, etc.  And while I wasn't expecting that it would have been interesting if it had fit the overall story.  But instead it was gimmicky to me. 


So, once again I have tried reading contemporary fiction and have been mighty disappointed.  I never used to read current stuff, not since I was a pre-teen/teenager reading young adult fiction.  That fiction was actually good back then so in principal I had nothing against giving newer stuff a try.  I dislike that a reader cannot be guided by a book's reputation as it's stood up through time as you can with classic texts.  If someone tells you this classic is great, it's reputation is well deserved - when you read the book you can be pretty assured that there will be some meaning or even great meaning that you'll get out of the time investment and the experience.  This is impossible with current literature. 


And in truth I have so many classic books on my shelves that I don't need to make the attempt.  And I probably wouldn't have if it wasn't for working in a library and now reading reviews of current fiction books.  But what I've noticed about much of today's fiction is that authors invent a pleasing premise to a story - i.e. Mouse being a young girl who comes of age but also has a quality that makes her different from anyone else - it sounds interesting and it's what makes you want to invest your time.  And then the idea is so poorly thought out, so poorly executed, and the story so poor.  So I'm starting to beware of gimmicky writers.  Then I get a sense of how much more of that stuff is out there than stuff of quality.  And that's disturbing.  And then I realize that we all have to learn to navigate through a sea of nonsense to get to valuable finds.  It's odd that we should make it so difficult on ourselves.  The personal life can be that way enough as it is - why should the collective, cultural life be so as well?  I guess the only answer is the money that's out there to made...