Mean Boy by Lynn Coady

Mean Boy is a brilliant spoof on creative writing schools and the remarkable life of a poet. I thought the author's characters were dead on, and she doesn't include an easy plot resolution. Her books are appealing, and yet impulsive. I did think that there was a sort of bogus resolution where she could have ended the book. The real ending felt anticlimactic, and like an attempt to finish on a note of seriousness, rather than wittiness. But the humor in the novel is so distorted by the sympathy and anxiety I felt for the main character and because of that I would have chosen the bogus ending to the real one.

3 Stars