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issendai (![[info]](http://www.journalfen.net/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} issendai) wrote in ![[info]](http://www.journalfen.net/img/community.gif){kind=small} unfunny_fandom, |
After reading the he said/she said between the reviewer and Pike, I had to see for myself what the story was like. Have some stream-of-consciousness commentary:
It's horrible.
The "joke" about wars being fought in front of the hotel isn't. The heroine says and thinks plenty of stereotypes about Turks/Arabs/LOL they're all the same LOL; and while some of them make sense in a "prejudiced American learns to take her head out of her ass" story, some of them are things she flat out should have known or noticed weren't true--like the capital of Turkey, or whether the majority of the people around her had curly hair.
First the father tells her not to use "hell" as a curse, since Turkey is an Arab country. ...Moron. Then Amesh tells her not to use "Christ" as a curse, since Turkey is an Arab country. ...Wha? Wouldn't an actual Turk know that Turkey isn't Arab? And would the members of a majority-Muslim country particularly care if someone committed blasphemy regarding her own religion? Would "Christ" even register as a swear word?
Amesh was orphaned at 10 and left school to work to support his grandfather. On one hand, yeah, okay, this happens. On the other hand, perhaps someone who knows Turkey could tell me whether it's likely to happen in modern-day Istanbul? It sounds suspiciously like the usual "Non-rich Arabs [sic] are all poor people who live in third-world countries under National Geographic-worthy conditions" story Westerners like to tell about that part of the world.
The desert is, in fact, right outside Istanbul. And we're not talking any wishy-washy Central Anatolia arid regions, we're talking SAHARA, motherfucker. Sand dunes.
Archaeology fail! The father is excited because they've discovered ruins 7,000 years old--possibly the oldest ever. Except for all those sites 9,000 and 10,000 years old, which apparently don't exist in this book. Maybe the Istanbul desert swallowed them.
Aaaaand then the heroine finds a carpet buried in the dirt, and of course it's a priceless antique, even a relic, and she's debating whether or not to turn it over to the authorities. Apparently the Istanbul desert is a great preserver of textiles, because under any other conditions a carpet buried directly in the earth would be a ruin within a couple of years.
Or maybe it's MAGIC.
That's it. I'm done.
Have I mentioned that the heroine is a snotty, whiny, self-obsessed brat? Amesh is a nice guy, if a bit too easily roped into enabling our heroine. But the heroine needs to be left in the middle of the Istanbul Sahara without a compass.
It's horrible.
The "joke" about wars being fought in front of the hotel isn't. The heroine says and thinks plenty of stereotypes about Turks/Arabs/LOL they're all the same LOL; and while some of them make sense in a "prejudiced American learns to take her head out of her ass" story, some of them are things she flat out should have known or noticed weren't true--like the capital of Turkey, or whether the majority of the people around her had curly hair.
First the father tells her not to use "hell" as a curse, since Turkey is an Arab country. ...Moron. Then Amesh tells her not to use "Christ" as a curse, since Turkey is an Arab country. ...Wha? Wouldn't an actual Turk know that Turkey isn't Arab? And would the members of a majority-Muslim country particularly care if someone committed blasphemy regarding her own religion? Would "Christ" even register as a swear word?
Amesh was orphaned at 10 and left school to work to support his grandfather. On one hand, yeah, okay, this happens. On the other hand, perhaps someone who knows Turkey could tell me whether it's likely to happen in modern-day Istanbul? It sounds suspiciously like the usual "Non-rich Arabs [sic] are all poor people who live in third-world countries under National Geographic-worthy conditions" story Westerners like to tell about that part of the world.
The desert is, in fact, right outside Istanbul. And we're not talking any wishy-washy Central Anatolia arid regions, we're talking SAHARA, motherfucker. Sand dunes.
Archaeology fail! The father is excited because they've discovered ruins 7,000 years old--possibly the oldest ever. Except for all those sites 9,000 and 10,000 years old, which apparently don't exist in this book. Maybe the Istanbul desert swallowed them.
Aaaaand then the heroine finds a carpet buried in the dirt, and of course it's a priceless antique, even a relic, and she's debating whether or not to turn it over to the authorities. Apparently the Istanbul desert is a great preserver of textiles, because under any other conditions a carpet buried directly in the earth would be a ruin within a couple of years.
Or maybe it's MAGIC.
That's it. I'm done.
Have I mentioned that the heroine is a snotty, whiny, self-obsessed brat? Amesh is a nice guy, if a bit too easily roped into enabling our heroine. But the heroine needs to be left in the middle of the Istanbul Sahara without a compass.
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