Book Whore

This week’s book is the highly under done “Third and Heaven” by Ben Patrick Johnson—best known as voice of “Entertainment Tonight”. The book says it’s the story of 4 best friends and their L.A. lives as hashed over at their favorite restaurant located at the corner of—say it with me—Heaven and Third.

The book seems promising at first with four interesting characters and their very LA lives. Each story is a combination of L.A. disengagement and how the Hollywood dream is lived with day to day. The story is about depression, fame, love and dreams and how they interweave the lives of Claire, Ritchie, Freddy, and Joshua.

The problem with the book as the stories progress there is a strange lack of details and depth in the characters and their plots. Some scenes are so well played that they are nearly magical and powerful without being too much but unfortunately these moments are paired with huge leaps of logic or startling with the lack of follow through. Even worse is when details are dropped and suddenly thrown in such as the race of one character, which isn’t even mentioned till the character leaves the plot, and the reader is left scratching their head.

I guess the fatal fall of the book is that the friendships don’t even feel real. Certain characters are just unlikable and mean and rude and you never understand way anyone would talk with them much less spend a day each week with them. And this paired with a few go nowhere plots and sudden moments of realization to make the ending work---well let’s just say this book is more Third then Heaven.