Review of The Last Great American Tragedy

[Justine Ocsebio]

[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "The Last Great American Tragedy" by Mary Spencer.]

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3 out of 4 stars

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Cordelia Shaw is grieving the death of her mother. She drinks a lot and isolates herself from her loved ones in order to cope. One night, Cordelia decides that it is best to end the pain once and for all. However, her attempt to drown herself in the lake fails when someone pulls her out of the water and away from her death. The next morning, she meets an enigmatic doctor, Henley Locke, and a special bond starts to blossom between the two. Cordelia and Henley eventually fall in love, but when the inevitable comes, will their love be able to conquer it?

The Last Great American Tragedy, a novel by Mary Spencer, is dedicated to ardent lovers of literature and philosophy. The lyrical prose was a joy to read. To my delight, I recognized many references from Greek mythology and poems by famous authors such as Edgar Allan Poe and Oscar Wilde. The writing was exquisite, and what I liked the most was how it articulated sentiments about grief and depression. It was poetic and true, and this was the aspect of the book that connected with me the most.

The author wrote the characters in a rather interesting way. I sometimes feel like I’m watching a period film because of the way Cordelia and Henley show and express their affections towards each other. The two of them are poets, passionately in love, and despite the modern setting, they are in their own world, frozen in time.

However, I sometimes feel like literary references are so abundant in the book that the narrative becomes a mere collage of quotes and verses taken from famous poems and books. The characters sometimes recite them when a reference doesn’t suit the scene well, making the line or speech lose its meaning and emotional resonance. I wasn’t invested in the love affair as much as I would’ve liked either. The male lead is much too perfect to be a three-dimensional character. It does not help that he speaks in verses a lot, which makes it difficult to see him as a real person I can care about and relate to.

I give the book 3 out of 4 stars. I appreciate the poetic writing. The book was professionally edited, as I found no errors. I didn’t give the book a full rating because there were issues that prevented me from fully appreciating it. I would recommend this novel to people who like reading books about books. Any bibliophile might be enticed by the abundance of literary references in this novel. This book would also appeal to people who like reading emotional romance stories.

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The Last Great American Tragedy
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[Dedyirwan Siregar]

life and death is predetermined, even if we pick him up, you could say the story in this book is very deep and touching, there is sadness, happiness, and frustration. But there is also love in it, extraordinary in my opinion personally.

[José Cortez]

Seems like an awesome book. Your review has made me curious to read this book. Thank you for your amazing review.

[Ghuddie]

It's never easy to deal with grief. This sounds like a great book.