The massive missile strikes have been hard to process, and I’m struggling. So I decided to start the year with a very light read by an extremely young writer. The Real Deal is about a reality TV show modeled on the one with the fat dance teacher and a group of little girls. Does anybody remember the name?
In any case, the book is very cute, very entertaining. Reality TV drama is all here, and it’s as overwrought and fake as ever. The author has an aggravating habit of saying “I was sat” and “I was stood” instead of “I was sitting” and “I was standing” but the story is enjoyable and reads easily.
The problem with the book is that, as I said, Caitlin Devlin is very young. I Googled her, and she’s a child. Aside from vague wokeness, she doesn’t have a point of view. As a result, she has no idea where to take her story or what to think of the characters. The novel has no ending, and a good, fun plot falls apart in a meandering, directionless collection of platitudes.
As I always say, life is unfair. Some of us have a point of view and a half but no imagination to create a story. Others can create great stories but have no intellect to fill them with meaning. Devlin still can develop in some direction, so I wouldn’t give up on her.
Nice book, entertaining but the last 30 pages a deeply boring.
Clarissa's Blog 
Was this book self published? I’m surprised a proper editor wouldn’t make her revise more.
Amanda
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I heard that “I was stood” is now acceptable even on BBC. It’s some sort of an inclusion practice. Like in “let’s include the illiterate!”
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So… when are we gonna get official acceptance for ain’t and y’all?
(crickets)
Oh, right, we will never be permitted to acceptability.
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““I was stood” is now acceptable even on BBC.”
British English is moving in very weird directions, quite independent of anything going on in North America….
I haven’t come across “I was stood” but “I was sat”… maybe…. I also really dislike some British forms like “different to” (instead of “different from”) Also “it were” (where you’d expect “it was”… I’ve heard that from a person with a PhD from Oxford).
Also “I gave him them” and things like “he should do” where I’d expect “he should”
and more… so many more….
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Historically Proper English was the version spoken by the upper classes as in My Fair Lady.
Inclusion means referring to dialects spoken by different classes and regions as equally valid
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“Inclusion means referring to dialects spoken by different classes and regions as equally valid”
A lot of the things I mentioned are used by the educated as well…. I purposely left off things that (maybe) are more limited to lower classes like “innit?” or maybe ‘cheers’ instead of ‘thank you’.
Pluricentric languages are very hard to hold together and I think many Americans would have real problems understanding more than 75-80% of real British speech (nothing like anything heard in American media).
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Very strange nitpick on the language (British English and American English are different, which cocky Americans never seem to acknowledge.) I recently read and enjoyed the book and have been looking for opinions online, and I have to say that I do find this review incredibly patronising. The author is 24, very much not a child, and to say that the book has no clear point of view is completely inaccurate. And when some of the main themes explored are recognising and legitimising trauma, and female queerness, your complaint of a general ‘wokeness’ feels very telling about you as an individual…
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If you took the trouble to actually read what you are responding to, you would have noticed the first sentence of my post. The one about the missile strikes. And if you had noticed it, you would have realized that referring to childish bleatings of spoiled little drama queens as “trauma” is both inappropriate and cruel. Especially on this date.
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If you took the trouble to actually read what you’re reviewing, you’d realise that you’re the exact kind of person the book critiques.
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I think you mean to say “criticizes”, not “critiques.”
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