Here we have Dale Peck doing the fish slapping dance with a few of his literary contemporaries, and I love it. They have to stand there rigid and appearing to be unconcerned while sprightly Dale hops around, derides them horribly, and slaps their chops with a large haddock. I would give this book 5 stars, but mostly, Dale is beating up on authors I haven't read and - now! - have no intention of reading, so it's mostly somebody else's (beautifully invectivised) argument. The authors here dissecte...

A nasty, boring book in which someone whose talent appears to have sputtered out years previously, attempted to gain some notoriety by taking a hatchet to the work of others. Sour grapes much, Dale? At least Jonathan Franzen has some talent to back up his obnoxious public persona. With this author there's all the obnoxiousness and very little talent.

"It seems to me that there are two strains of literature currently in vogue - what I have referred to...as recherché postmodernism and recidivist realism - and both of them, in my opinion, suck," writes Dale Peck. "As one reads contemporary novelists, one can't shake the feeling that they write for one another rather than some more or less common reader. Their prose shares a showiness that speaks of solidarity and competition..." I certainly don't disagree with his conclusions that much of curre...

Well, as my dad used to say, "If you can't say something mean and funny . . . then just say something mean." Dale Peck works that maxim all the way to the bitter end.

I read this years ago, probably in 2005.It was so good. Probably I would give it a five, except for the one review which wasn't a hatchet job.

For the most part, Dale Peck is a smart reader and a fluent writer. I like a bold opinion and I love a withering screed. Several of the targets of Peck's criticism (I'm looking at you Sven Birkerts and Stanley Crouch) are overdue for a take-down and, uncharitable blowhards themselves, they'll get no crocodile tears from me. But the net result of reading these relentlessly nasty reviews in a collection was a dislike of Dale Peck that grew with each essay. I guess it's like comic relief in a thril...

I don't have much patience for pompous blowhards. Pompous blowhard, thy name is Dale Peck.Are there some valid points made in this book? Yes, some. That being said, I have far more respect when the opinions come from someone who has talent that outshines those who are the subject of the harsh criticism. Peck is not even close. It's as though a man who has crafted an adequate stained glass window turns around and starts screaming at the ghost of Louis Comfort Tiffany for producing "schlock." Sorr...

While it's wrong to laud a critic merely for agreeing with me, that's what I'm going to do.Peck doesn't really assert these points so much as posit them on his way to dismember his contemporaries, but since I find them excellent literary axioms, I'll repeat them:-James Joyce's collection Dubliners--particularly the story "The Dead"--is one of the best in the prose fiction canon, but by Ulysses he is setting a pretty poor example.-Thomas Pynchon is undeniably a fantastic writer but his his novels...

There is some truth to Peck's claim that his critics are more interested in "the possibility of a brawl" than in what he has to say about today's fiction. Reviewers say they can't fathom how the highly regarded author of the novel Now It's Time to Say Goodbye and What We Lost, the story of his father's 1950s childhood, has the audacity to vilify his colleagues. Although reviewers feel scandalized, disgusted, or fascinated by his sweeping condemnations (is Rick Moody really "the worst writer of h...

He really dislikes some of the authors I like (DFW and Jonathan Franzen), but Peck has a sharp critical eye and a very engaging/caustic style. There is a very complimentary essay on Kurt Vonnegut at the end of the book, though, and that warmed my heart. I'm glad he doesn't hate everything.

An awful bunch of tantrums, written solely to garner the author some brief attention. I think he's writing teenage vampire sci-fi novels now, which, enough said.

I agree with him in principle but his execution lacks chop.

Moderately interesting. Not enough variation to make the entire book worth finishing.

Some readers have complained that this aptly titled work isn't as meaningful or useful as B. R. Myers' A READER'S MANIFESTO and I agree, but I still enjoy Peck's eviscerations of what passes for contemporary American literature. (The one recent book he discusses that I've read, Sven Birkerts' GUTENBERG ELEGIES, I liked more than he did but I have no problem taking his word for how awful most of the others are.) In my view, Peck runs into trouble when he attempts a deeper analysis of what went wr...

I read this book because I dislike most contemporary literary fiction. So does this author. So I was hoping that I would learn more about why I hate most novels published within the last few years. Unfortunately these essays are mostly bitter, mean, and stupid, which is a shame, because many of them contain well-reasoned investigations of various authors.The best essay was, to me, a sort of elegy for Kurt Vonnegut (which is strange, because he wasn't dead when this was published). I completely a...

A mildly interesting bunch of essays and reviews that certainly takes no quarter with their topics. He doesn't like much, and is generally clear about why he doesn't. His picking apart of the opening of the Jim Crace novel is done much like an English teacher would, to show that the writing just doesn't make much sense. His high opinion of Vonnegut is a bit odd to me, and I think he misses the point of the narration of American Pastoral, but what he says about Jamaica Kincaid, Terry McMillan and...

Don't read this and then try to write anything, ever.The first piece is hilarious, a long-deserved crucifixion of the unconscionably boring Sven Birkerts; but then I stopped laughing when I hit the subsequent reviews, in which he CARVES INTO Wallace, Franzen, Moody, DeLillo, et al. Oh, and Joyce. And Faulkner.Also, for someone who's so high and mighty about English syntax, he can at times write confusingly. There are oddly murky places in the prose, in sharp contrast to the sizzling lacerating w...

I just finished reading this for the second time. For people who pay attention, Peck made a huge name for himself a few years ago when he starting swinging like crazy at writers he thought were wasting their talent, including his infamous line about Rick Moody being "the worst writer of his generation." I like him because, like James Wood, he actually cares about what's going on with books, not just getting a paycheck for writing his essay. This is one of those collections that add up to a missi...

This is an entertaining and lucid collection of book reviews from a thoughtful, talented writer. Particularly amusing are the reviews in which Peck critiques Jonathan Franzen, David Foster Wallace and the other pretentious hacks who regularly receive critical fellatio from the rest of the literary establishment. Dale Peck does engage in hyperbole for dramatic effect, but most of these are considered and astute perspectives, the title notwithstanding.

Not only does Peck review books, providing criticism and analysis, but he criticizes critics and reviews book reviews.Hehe.He says nasty things about writers and reviewers. Tehe.It's all very rousing and silly in an entertaining way. Plus it's short and small and fits in the front pocket of my brown corduroy jacket.

Dale Peck has not really taught me anything about literature, but could write a damn monograph for OUP about the value of self-promoting bitchery. Bonus points: "David Foster Wallace, you can now sleep easy, because you have just been READ."

I never really read lit crit or reviews but I find Dale Peck hilarious and often spot on. So hit me.

talked about it here: http://5cense.com/earth.htm

i laughed out-loud throughout. it's the antidote to acclaimed and terrible contemporary writers.