PositiveThe Scotsman (UK)Good...funny ... If Hera kept one foot on the ground as more of an observer, Green Dot could make loads of sardonic observations about modern office life and modern relationships, though maybe that would get repetitive and be uninvolving. There are still a good number of both but Gray realises that a better story, gripping and truthful, comes from her heroine metaphorically bungee-ing from Sydney Harbour Bridge, drying herself off, climbing onto the roof of the opera house and doing it again.
Martin Amis
PositiveThe Scotsman (UK)\"Do I want to do this? The opening words—\'Welcome! Do step in…\'—unnerve. He introduces his cat, Spats. Do I want the one-time enfant terrible of the BritLit scene to be this chummy and chatty? Soon, in the margins, I’m scribbling \'His worst-ever book?\' But later this changes to \'best-ever?\' ... The absolute best of this book concerns not sex but death ... Amis has battled through Inside Story to declare it will probably be his \'last long novel\' but I hope not.
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John Jeremiah Sullivan
RaveThe Scotsman (UK)I HATE John Jeremiah Sullivan. He gets thousands of words...for a feature on Axl Rose. He uses up lots of them on his teenage obsession with Guns N’ Roses ... He follows the band all the way to Bilbao. He doesn’t get the interview with Rose. He dares to submit his copy without any quotes, save for \'Ooooooo, I need you.\' The magazine publishes the piece, doubtless big-style. And what do I get? A few hundred to tell you that the book which wraps it up with essays on cave paintings, the Tea Party, reality TV, but mostly music, is terrific ... Compared, with good reason, to David Foster Wallace, JJS uses his bountiful words well, writing unhurriedly with warmth and quiet insight, and resisting the temptation to sneer at soft targets ... Sullivan’s the man for the job, dammit.
