I got This Languid Earth as a review copy in order to do a review in this space. I had never read Paul McCormack before; he found me through The Indie View. This Languid Earth is a book that struggles to find a genre. It starts as a paranormal book, then gradually becomes a romance, and then, quite suddenly, it becomes science fiction. I worry that it will struggle to draw the appeal of a wide audience because of this.
The book begins with an introduction to Lyle, a rather typical cubicle worker. We see Lyle throughout a boring day, a life that so many people lead and hate. I immediately thought of Edward Norton in the beginning of Fight Club, Ron Livingston from Office Space, or even Keanu Reeves from the Matrix, all before the story started. In our first introduction to Lyle he is visited by a ghost who calls herself Nicole and seems to know everything about him. We leave Lyle as he is tuning into the broadcast of a radio preacher. After a long sermon by the preacher, the first of many, we are introduced to Moses, the preacher’s organist and are told how he met the preacher. Once this is done the book then transitions into a series of letters from Lyle and Moses to unknown parties.
As I’m sure you can see This Languid Earth jumps around a lot. I found it to be quite frustrating, it seemed that as soon as I started to become invested in one storyline I was thrown into another. Then, by the time I got back to the first one I had forgotten too much to care. I think the book could have benefitted from some restructuring. If the storylines intertwined they would be more likely to hold the reader’s attention. Intertwining the stories might also help to grab the reader’s attention in the beginning of the book. As it is I struggled through the first half. It wasn’t until then that the conflict of the book was revealed.
The conflict itself was also a let down. The premise is really well thought out, and I like the eventual solution, I just think that it could have used some more attention. McCormack spent a lot of time on a love story that was only one aspect of a complex plot; he should have spent more on the conflict that this love story created. Getting focused on the love story aspect also messed up the pacing. I noticed a tendency for McCormack to get bogged down in details, for example spending two pages describing Lyle’s entire apartment just for it to play no larger role in the later story, and I think this is what happened with the love story.
As Vonnegut says “Every sentence must do one of two things—reveal character or advance the action;” McCormack struggles with this. There are entire sections of This Languid Earth that seem to have no apparent purpose. Maybe showing Lyle having “the talk” with his father introduced us to a keystone of his character, but if it did I certainly didn’t pick up on what it was. Many parts of This Languid Earth are a slog to get through, and I think cleaning them up would go a long way to improving the pace of the story.
For all of its faults I still enjoyed This Languid Earth. McCormack creates some very interesting concepts and deals with them in unique ways. I especially like the ending. This Languid Earth has a lot of potential, but I think it still needs some work before it can live up to its potential.
If you are interested in checking out This Languid Earth you can find it here.
john swenson 