Monday, January 2, 2012

What a difference perspective makes!

The following are two different comments posted on Goodreads. The are of the same book, Curbchek. Same edition, within 24 hours of each other. Always amazes me how different people are in what they see and expect from the world around them. Take a look..... The first reader has grasped exactly why I wrote the book,  the second reader is bored with the entire book.... what a difference their perspectives make.  What are your thoughts?


The readers venture into the darkest realms of the world after "Daywalkers" have safely crawled into their beds for the night. In the whirlwind rides under the cover of darkness, Zach Fortier tries to remain human and relatively normal while patrolling messed up streets and neighborhoods. The author does a great job presenting the grit police officers face on a daily basis as well as the tension that arises between officers. He also stresses frequently the need for officers to listen to people, pay attention to detail, remain loyal to their code of honor, and find some comic relief in all the madness. Anyone who has ever had police officer friends hears tales told in this same way. Police officers take whatever calls come in during their shift; these calls range all over the board from the ridiculous call of the woman locking herself inside her car to vicious acts of murder. When recounting the calls, there is typically a hint of arrogance, extra added fluff, and sometimes all around madness. 'Curb Chek' portrays a fairly honest image of real life on the darkened streets from a police officer's point of view and recounts comical, sad, and other stories in the fashion expected if sitting down with him at the end of his weekend shift.

 "Curbchek chronicles the experiences of a police officer, describing different patrol calls he answered and trying to balance some kind of a "normal" home life.
The premise behind the book seemed very interesting, and I was really looking forward to reading it. I was quite disappointed and totally bored with the whole thing. Each story was only a few paragraphs long, leading from one story to the next without any sense of organization. Even going from chapter to chapter seemed pretty random. I suppose that another police officer could relate to what he went through on a day to day basis, but I believe that is as far as it would go.
Had the author went into more detail and grouped the stories together in a way that related to each other, it could have had the potential to be the mind gripping novel that I was hoping to find.

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