A review by qu33nofbookz
Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin

2.0

There are about three different stories being told here and only two of them are really connected or matter. This was also written by a guy who swallowed the dictionary to spit it out as a story without having read that dictionary first to see what all the words really meant. The story, such as it was rambles on and diverges several times into meaningless tangents that have and give nothing to the main story which it takes forever to get back to. You could cut this book in half and still have the essential story line. I think this guy may have believed he was being paid by the word. For most of the story you have no idea what time period it takes place in and when they do tell you the year you will think it's a typo. The last 1/4 of the book is in the time line 1995 to 2000 but it written as if they are still in the early 1900's until the last few chapters. Also the clash that the rich and upper middle class people in the book live in an elite and wonderful city where life is simple and good while the poor and lower class live in an apocalyptic dystonia hell whole in the same city doesn't work. Either the city is modern and everyone and thing is like it is today or it's in ruins with fires burning and streets chocked with horrible people doing horrible things to everyone else on it, you can't have both at the same time. Lastly except for just a few lines of the city in summer to help the characters move from point a to point b with ease the city is locked in a permanent winter where it's hard to get around and it's very cold but just so beautiful that no one seems to care. If it were winter all the time like is described they would be out of food besides meat very shortly. I give it two stars because the first half of the book was great, the middle just okay but growing annoying and the last bit I wish I had skimmed through.