Yep. They loved alliteration the way more modern English poetry loved rhyme.

I think it works better for English, personally.

It works in German, too, but it does have a tendency to turn phrases into tongue twisters.

A perfectly plausible prediction.

It just irritates me in this book because it takes away focus from the characters and the story.

Seriously, though. Alliterations are like puns: silly word games. Fun in small doses, but it would get tiresome if overused. Although I have to admit, JK Rowling used both liberally in the Potter books, and that never got old for me in those books. Snape especially seemed to indulge in the alliteration.

I loved Snape's alliterations. With this book ,however, it seems to be mostly in the narrative, not in the dialogue where it could be attributed to the quirks of a character.

"She was sure the only reason that Hollick wanted to see him was to sack him. She was surprised when he returned looking despondent but not devastated."

And so on....

Ugh. That's pretty bad. A whole book full of it would get miserable to read.

Pure cheek. ;D

Yes! I thought so; excellently executed! ;-)

(I adore alliteration, although admittedly it's perhaps not advantageous for the advancement of clarity.)

I'll stop now - MT might take longer though; he's still reeling them off.

Hehe. Fun for all of the family.

Seriously, tho, there's a time and place for stylistic devices and overuse just comes off as pretentious and trying for form over substance, and that is, while beautiful in small doses and in poetry, not a good thing in a novel.

Completely agreed. I often do it by accident, and sometimes by design, but I doubt I'd enjoy it overmuch in my books.

I'm at 16%, and she is still going strong on the alliteration. :(
I have a strong feeling this will be a DNF.

We also now have foreshadowing, but the rest is kinda convoluted blah.

I hate foreshadowing. It's almost never done gracefully.

How about this?

"He claimed to be writing a Family Biography that the Family would have to pay him not to publish. Ammu said that there was only one person in the family who was a fit candidate for biographical blackmail and that was Chacko himself.
Of course that was then. Before the Terror."

That whole paragraph is just awkward.

And this is just one paragraph,.... *sighs*

omg... no. Both because, as Tannat said, the whole paragraph is awkward, and because that's foreshadowing with a sledgehammer.

Yeah, ..... this book won the Booker. Did I mention that?

Um. I gotta ask. Why?

This is why I don't read literary fiction.

The only recent Booker winners that I've liked have been by Hillary Mantel.

This is why I don't read book award titles. Or literary fiction, really.

I like literary fiction a lot. What I don't get is the Booker selection criteria. It's almost like a double-think issue where a book gets selected that the Booker committee thinks the general public would find just off-putting enough to believe it is literary fiction.

So, far I have encountered only two Booker winners that were worth reading: The Sea, the Sea by Iris Murdoch and The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood. The rest so far - and I have gotten very discouraged to try any more of the award winners - have been rather disappointing.

Too often I find that "literary fiction" is code for "whiny old man fiction". But that's just me trying to figure out why I don't like it.

There is some of that, even if this would not apply to this particular book.

No, I realized that when I read the description. But the description just leads me to ask "So why do I care? What? They're growing up in a car because they can't get a tow-truck?"

My problem with a lot of modern literary prize winners is that they seem to emphasize how beautiful the writing is, without saying if there's, you know, a PLOT to go with that writing.

@Tannat: I see what you mean. I guess, the story needed some framework even if it isn't particularly interesting, but I can't really bring myself to defend the book or, in more general terms, a "literary fiction" label that just doesn't make for interesting reading/angles.

@Susanna: I hear you. I NEED plot, too. It does not have to be a great plot, but there needs to be some movement in the story. Just...something.

No worries. I like some plot with my writing too. This book requires no defense.