Scented Gardens for the Blind

Rating:
Summary: The Book That Taught Me Not To Read Book-Jacket Reviews
Review: First off, what the hell? Who wrote that cunning spoiler on the back jacket of the book, and what were they thinking?
Secondly, this book is a great example of what happens when an author thinks she/-s can get away with using a characters anomie/mental illness/estrangement from society as an excuse to imitate what others have done better - stream of thought/temporal leaps/characters bleeding over into each other.
Thirdly, the book would have been much better, perhaps it would have fully redeemed itself had a wise editor patted Frame on the back and said "Your readers aren't stupid, why don't you remove the second half of every sentence/paragraph where you tell them what the first half meant" - I'm not at all at odds with the telling/showing paradigm, it's great to `tell', if done tactfully, but goodness me, Frame, give us credit!
I don't know anything about this author: picked up the book mostly on a whim due to the excellent graphic design on the cover, and the decent NY Times review on the back.
I would be interested to know if this was perhaps an experiment, on Frame's part. Perhaps she developed these elements more convincingly in her latter works. There are a lot of fertile themes that run throughout the book that, had they been handled more tactfully, would have made for a very satisfying read.


Rating:
Summary: Beautiful
Review: I know, i'm a loser. I wasn't aware of Janet Frame until I saw "Angel at My Table." Better late... The strange and estranged life of the Glace family, all sensory-deprived-- father Edward has left wife and daughter and now spends his time studying the geneology of another family, daughter Erlene has gone mute, and wife Vera has gone blind. Each character lives in a lush world of their own making, never quite understanding what the others want of them. Frame's writing is right on target--she never wastes a word.

Rating:
Summary: Beautiful
Review: I know, i'm a loser. I wasn't aware of Janet Frame until I saw "Angel at My Table." Better late... The strange and estranged life of the Glace family, all sensory-deprived-- father Edward has left wife and daughter and now spends his time studying the geneology of another family, daughter Erlene has gone mute, and wife Vera has gone blind. Each character lives in a lush world of their own making, never quite understanding what the others want of them. Frame's writing is right on target--she never wastes a word.

Rating:
Summary: very drab.
Review: The first thing that disappointed me about this book was that fact that the blurb on the back gives away what seems to be the only thing that would even come close to a plot twist. That has nothing to do with the acutal writing itself, but it was rather a spoiler.

Then I started to actually read the book, which was worse. Frame uses 40-word setences when being 'descriptive'. She ends up to near rambling, and using almost hackneyed descriptions of what the characters do.

Her whole idea is very intriguing, but she goes nowhere with it. The end of the book is in the blurb, and even if it was not, it would still be a very boring read. No empathy or connection was made with any of the charachters, false or not. They were stiff and dull.