Monday, February 16, 2009

Dear Sir:
I recently read your latest hardcover release The Associate and wanted to write you regarding a few items of note.

I believe we can both agree that you write courtroom dramas for the masses and are in no way shooting for a Pulitzer Prize in literature. So it was with an open mind that I read The Associate.

This may have been a mistake. It is though you woke up one morning and said, “I think I will write a book today. A books about lawyers.” Then, eight hours later, sent the book to your publisher who ran it through Microsoft Word to spell-check it and published it sight unseen.

My only hope is that James Patterson actually killed you, made a suit out of your skin and wrote the book (or paid one of his assistants to write it) and published under your name.

First, a book is supposed to have a beginning, middle and end. There is supposed to be a conflict and a resolution. This is a formula you have stuck to in the past and it seems to work. Perhaps we could revisit this for the next book? Unless you already wrote it?

Second, if you want us to have sympathy for your characters, perhaps you shouldn’t make them date rapists.

Third, Let us revisit my first point in which I reminded you of the basic skeleton of a novel, specifically an ending.

Let us imagine for one moment that you didn’t write this book in one day. Even if you spent two years on this book, the ending definitely reads as though you realized your Hot Pocket was about to be done in the microwave and just gave up on any real conclusion.

In short, I was very disappointed and now when people ask me if the book was any good and worth buying the hardcover, I will have to lie and say yes.
You are not making it any easier for a bookseller to sell your books.

Though I bet you are okay with that as I imagine you are sitting on your private yacht while some intern reads this letter and files it under S for shred.

Sincerely,

Bry

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