The Bottom Line: A melodramatic book without the proper drama or depth--falls flat on its face with uninspired characters and a story that goes nowhere.
JiggyJay's Full Review: Douglas Coupland - Miss Wyoming
I've been meaning to go through my bookshelf and read a lot of the ones that have been collecting dust and the newest one for me to pick up was Douglas Coupland's Miss Wyoming.
I took a break from this author after three lame books in a row from him (after two books, which I consider to be among the best I've ever read) and after reading this one it's safe to say that I've hit his lowest point as a writer.
Coupland hit the mainstay of the book and art world with his 1991 Generation X novel that featured his interesting writing style and revamp of all things nineties at such an early time. Praised by many, he went on to write a few more successful books, but in 1999 he produced Miss Wyoming, which was his first novel written in the third person and it shows.
Miss Wyoming has a weird plot--it's about an actress, Susan Colgate, vanishing after a plane crash only to have a random Hollywood producer, John Johnson, going through a mid-life crisis wanting to track her down. These two parallel each other throughout the whole story and their actions and isolation from the world around them make them fairly interesting...
...But not well written. A majority of the characters are so similar in juxtaposition that you can really see the holes in Coupland as a writer. Both Johnson and Miss Wyoming herself, Susan Colgate, are shallow characters and by the lame ending of the book, I really didn't feel anything for these two nor any of the supporting characters.
The story never really moves anywhere (and is slow at best) and is the filler for Coupland's zany humor, which runs in abundance here. I really enjoy his humor as it's very weird and well-written and in some of his books (JPod and The Gum Thief) it works really well with the story that he's developing. Here, it's a big bag of bad ideas amidst a platform for his diatribes of weirdness. While there were some funny parts of the novel, it wasn't worth reading all 300-some pages.
Douglas Coupland is definitely an author I recommend. Aside from many flat books in his catalog, he also has ones full of heart and comedy that mix very well and are thoroughly enjoyable, but I don't know what went wrong here.
His "voice" in the piece was shadowed by too many flanks that were going in the wrong direction of cohesiveness. In the end, I felt like he was trying to accomplish something good, but ultimately created an idea that went stale less than halfway through.
I'm not just disappointed with how boring the story was and how unengaged I was with the characters, but I'm hoping that you do not read this book and tarnish the image of a great author. Skip this one and try another one of his books that might suit your fancy such as the few I've already mentioned. I'm bewildered at the shallow wit and depth of this piece--you should spare yourself.
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.