Detailed plot synopsis reviews of Young Jane Young |
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The story of an illicit affair with a congressman could have been filled with drama. But then, having set the story up, the author made a series of terrible choices:
1) She made Aviva EXACTLY like Monica Lewinsky, down to her physical description (fat, big breasts) and the kind of sex she engaged in (cock sucking). It was simply too unoriginal.
2) She switched perspectives too many times. Who wants to read a section of the book from Mrs. Levin's perspective? I don't. Who wants to read pages and pages of Ruby's emails to her pen pals in Indonesia? Not me. I got the impression that the author got the idea for the basic story but then got writer's block, realized the story was too short, and then padded it with uninteresting characters who were not central to the story. When the last 25% of the book was a rehash of the story from the first 25%, I became certain that the author simply ran out of ideas.
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3) Aviva made decisions without explanation. She suddenly kissed the Congressman. Why? She decided to let Jorge, a complete stranger, bone her. Why? No explanation. Romance makes no sense, has no dramatic impact, when characters simply "do" things without laying a foundation first. The author simply didn't know how to write a romance or how to write about peoples' emotions.
4) We were robbed of a lot of great dramatic moments. Ruby never got to meet Levin. Ruby never got to learn the identity of her father. Ruby never got to meet her father. Aviva never got to confront Levin again. The story almost seemed designed to avoid dramatic confrontations.
The most interesting parts of this story was the illicit romance with Levin, and Ruby confronting her cock sucking Mom about her real identity. These are the things that could have been developed more into a good story.
Imagine if the author had cut out about 75% of the book--the last 25%, which is a rehash of the first 25% (or vice-versa), the entire section about Embeth, and the entire section about emails to Muslims in Indonesia. Instead, show us, with emotional reasoning, how Aviva falls in love with Levin. Show it gradually. Show us how she seduces him, gradually. Don't simply have her kiss him on one page and suck his dick on the next. Show us a seduction.
Then show us an illicit romance. Show us an illicit romance with the increasing risk of being caught. That's called creating dramatic tension.
Then, when you jump to the part about Ruby, show her confronting her real father. Emphasize dramatic confrontations rather than avoiding them. That is the essence of good writing, something the author (who, by the way, from her photo looks a LOT like Monica Lewinsky), obviously doesn't know how to do. It feels like the author did way too much "literary cock sucking" and way too little literary foreplay, that is, development of motive, and exposition of character conflict. There, that's the very last time I get to write cock sucking in this summary.
Cock sucking.
Cock sucking.
Cock sucking!
Heh heh heh.
