by Matthew Pearl

After checking this book out from the library four times, I can finally put it to rest.  A while back, I had read The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl, and loved it.  It quickly became a favorite book.  The thing about The Dante Club though, was that it took a while for the story to become engaging.  But once I got into it, I was unable to put the book down.

So I had high anticipations for The Poe Shadow.  It took me a long while to get into it in the first place.  I would pick it up, begin reading, and then quickly become bored.  But I trudged on.  I remembered the reward of continuing with The Dante Club, and I was looking forward to The Poe Shadow taking off, but sadly, it never did.  I had hopes, in fact, around page 120 it picked up a bit, and I became excited that the book was finally going to become exciting and enchanting.  But it wasn’t long before it became mired down in fact and truth and it was just plain boring.  There was a good story in there, it just didn’t get an opportunity to overtake what seemed to become a dissertation on Edgar Allen Poe’s demise.

I can’t recommend this book.  Not even slightly.  I just kept reading and trudging, and then I got to the point where I thought I might as well finish it, and I had to force myself to keep picking the thing up.  I was so relieved to finish this book, and I will be thrilled to drop it off at the library and never see it again.

Come on Mr. Pearl.  Do better next time would you?  Based on The Dante Club alone I will be checking out his next work as soon as it’s available, I just sure hope it delivers better than this one did.