Books - Wideacre

I haven't read much historical fiction in the past. Aside, that is, from one summer in my early teens when I spent most of a long visit to my Grandparents' house working through a stack of my Grandma's historical Mills & Boons. I'd blame my skewed ideas about romance on that summer but I think...actually sod it....I'm blaming my skewed ideas about romance on that summer.

Anyway, I picked up Philippa Gregory's Wideacre from the withdrawn books pile at work on a whim, thinking I'd give it a go. Boy do I wish I hadn't. When I think of the things I could have done in the time I spent reading that book. I could have wormed the cats, cleaned the grout in my bathroom or stuck pins under each one of my fingernails. Any one of these tasks would have been more enjoyable than that drivel. Not for the first time I wished I didn't have the compulsion to finish every book I start.

If you're looking for a repetetively tedious plotline, cliched characters and  insipid melodrama then you will love this book. Incidentally, Wideacre also contains some of the most cringe-worthy sex scenes I've ever come across. This is not because they are overly graphic, or even due to the incestuous nature of the book, but merely that they are so awkwardly written as to induce a feeling not unlike a sudden sex scene on the television when you're sitting on the sofa with your gran.