Fricktured Friday.

Fricktured Friday

Have you ever read a book that was so bad you just KNOW that you could do it better? Well, me too... Cause I think I just finished the worst book I have ever read in my life.

One of my favourite political commentators, Ben Shapiro took a crack at the fiction genre and in my opinion, failed miserably at it... He wrote a book called ‘True Allegiance’ And I’m not sure I’ve ever read a more haphazardly thrown together “novel”.

There were about 7 different characters and plot lines, all of which were connected, kind of... But you never really felt “CONNECTED” to any of the characters. They all just felt like classic action movie cutouts, with no real substance to them. It was impossible to FEEL connected to any of the characters in any real way.

The plot lines were basically just the news headlines from 2015, with a little bit of fiction thrown in there to make it a novel, and not a very compelling novel at that. At about 170 pages in, I just wanted it to be over...

But, I have a compulsion to finish any novel I start, so I saw it through to the end... And I got to say, those last 100 or so pages didn’t make the novel any better, or conclude it in a real satisfying way.. It just kind of ended, in the most garbage way possible.

I was really looking forward to reading this book, and given how intelligent Ben is I didn’t think his fiction writing would be so god awful, but it is... Making that good ole Einstein quote seem more relevant to me than ever.

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world, stimulating progress, giving birth to evolution."

And I can say without a doubt that his novel didn’t evolve the genre of fiction, even slightly. He’s far to analytical and fact based to write fiction.

Which is probably why I never felt connected to any of the characters in the novel. He didn’t bring them into existence with his imagination, he just copied and pasted what he thought “action heroes” should be. And it showed....

It was just such a let down. But it made me appreciate fiction writing, including my own, more than ever. Because you can be a Harvard graduate with all the knowledge that that encompasses. But if you don’t have a good imagination, you’ll never be able to write a compelling fiction novel. And you’re best bet is to just stick to political commentary.

Holy crap, it was a terrible book. Don’t buy it! I’ll give you my copy if you want to read it. :P

Here’s some art to cheer up this post!

Hope you have a good weekend. Hopefully wherever you are it’s warmer than here. Cause right now “April showers, bring may flowers” is a total lie. We’ve got snow storms... And I’m not sure those bring anything pleasant in may, or otherwise... :P

Happy Friday Everyone, Sincerely Bret Frick.