Dale Loves Sophie to Death: A Novel

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing! Read "The Evidence Against Her" instead.
Review: What a waste of the author's considerable writing talent - every character in this dreary, depressing story is self-absorbed, amoral and unlikable. The main character is Dinah, the mother of three children under age 10, whose baseless obsession with past wrongs leads her to return every summer with her children, but without her husband, to a rented house in the Ohio town where she grew up. Dinah's profound and exaggerated sense of victimhood pervades her entire existence and her utter self absorption prevents her from conducting any sort of meaningful adult relationship and seriously compromises her ability to care for her needy young children. Every character in this book, from Dinah's philandering, thoughtless, left-behind-husband and her neglected, constantly complaining children, to her borderline sociopath psychiatrist father and her vague, ineffectual mother are well-drawn but without any redeeming human qualities to make them seem warm or even interesting. Skip this early (yet somehow award-winning) effort, and instead read "The Evidence Against Her" in which the author does an much better job of depicting nuanced characters who are humanly flawed but far more interesting to read about.