Book report

(I'm double posting this on both blogs...because I can.)

Last night, I finished reading The Tenth Circle, Jodi Picoult's most recent novel.

While not my favorite Picoult story, the presentation itself was unique. She used a cartoonist to graphically illustrate the book between sections, portraying a superhero and his travels through the different levels of hell (a variation on Dante's Inferno). Each cartoon revealed the emotions of the main character--in fact it was written as if he were drawing the cartoons.

I was never a big comic book fan (except Archie and Jughead--I bought every one of those books for months and months when I was a kid--and The Family Circus--my eyes still naturally gravitate toward that circle when I randomly open the newspaper to the comics. I have piles of both of those comic books hidden away somewhere in a box in the attic). Superheroes especially bored me to tears, so I struggled to concentrate on these drawings in the book long enough to "get" them, but wow, what a creative idea!

A surprise awaits the reader at the end of the book. Kind of gimmicky, but fun...and dare I say, educational. :) Other than going back to study a writer's technique, this is the first time I've ever flipped back and forth through a book for an extended period of time after I finished reading.

Oh, that I (or my future publisher anyway) should have such a creative idea for a novel one of these days.