Customer Reviews

Barranca (Eddie Caminetti Novels)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

This is not your usual Eddie Camenetti golf adventure. In fact, the golf is very much a side piece to the book. It is much more of a comment on the foibles of our governments, the media that cover them and what motivates both told in very biting satire. The structure of the story is interesting. In the first section of the book we read "the beginning of the story." In the second part we are told the "end of the story." At the end we are told "the middle of the story." Of course, it is the middle that makes all the rest understandable.

Some of the characters of the book are very entertaining, perhaps none more so than the GNN "war correspondent" Mona Bertram who might just remind you a wee bit of CNN's "war chick", Christiana Amanpor.

To outline the story here would spoil the read. It is a clever effort and sometimes it is a bit too clever. Other times it hits home with some truths that make you pause. When the Secretary of Homeland Security is asked by the president's chief of staff if he can help in a situation, it is pointed out that he "was happy to do anything, as his was a thankless a job as any to be found on the planet and he was always on the lookout for things, however small, that might earn him some recognition or gratitude. Like people who cleaned toilets or maintained computers, his success was utterly dependant on absolutely nothing bad happening, and when it didn't, nobody noticed. It was only when the plumbing backed up or the operating system wiped itself out or a building got blown up that anyone paid any attention and then all manner of hell would pour down and the trouble free years to that point wouldn't even be a rounding error in the balancing of recriminatory accounts."

Eddie is more fun when doing his thing on the golf course and hopefully he will be returned there for the next effort.

Troon McAllister, beloved by many for creating Eddie Caminetti and using him so wisely in his first three books, The Green, The Foursome and Scratch, completely missed the ball in Barranca. This book has less than 1/4 of it's pages dedicated to the man we love to see hustle, Eddie. The rest is filled with half-developed characters who we really have no interest in. We spend more time hearing about Mona Bertram's hair care than Eddie's golf hustle with the coffee revolutionary Barranca. While revisiting characters can be difficult the cover says " An Eddie Caminetti Novel" I don't think it was and wish I had followed the advice of other reviewers who suggested avoiding this one. Hope Troon finds the fairway with his next book.

Sorry Troon, but you put a snowman up on this one. What a big disappointment. I loved the other Eddie C. books... I always tried to read one as spring approached to get me in the golfing mood. But this ain't no golf book... and barely and Eddie C. book. I feel like I was duped. For others considering this as their next followup to The Green, The Foursome, and Scratch.... don't.

While Barranca may be a "good" book, I was most disappointed with it. After reading The Green, The Foursome, and Scratch, I was willing to do just about anything to get my hands on another Eddie Caminetti novel. For all intents and purposes, this is not an Eddie Caminetti novel. Eddie plays almost a minor role in the story, and there's none of the depthy cleverness of the first three novels as it pertains to the world of golf. Troon McAllister (a.k.a. Lee Gruenfeld) missed the mark on this one.

I have followed this series with passion. I have loved the three previous books. Each was cleaver, funny and deeply entertaining. For this book I had to struggle to keep reading it and had to put it down on several occassions. I have yet to finish the book! I have read about 80% of it and could not go further. Although some of the commentary about society and corporate sponsoring is amusing, the book was conspicuously lacking enough of Caminetti. I read the books because of HIM. If you want to write social commentary send an editorial to the newspaper or go on Larry King. I paid to read about Eddie and escape the issues of society. I hope that the next (if there is one) is stongly focused around eddie and his adventures. The earlier books were such good efforts that this was a HUGH disappointment.

I have mixed feelings about this one. The premise is great, and it starts out laugh out loud funny with a steady stream of the author's wry, tongue in cheek humor. About one-third of the way in, the cleverness slows down markedly and the story gets told. Finally, at the end, we get the real story that is almost preachy and serious.

Don't get me wrong. I really liked this book, and I considered giving it a 5. The cynicism toward politics and the media are absolutely on target, but something about the changes of pace and the preachy tone took a bit of the edge off for me.

The Green and Scratch are both better.

could not wait to get my hands on this new mcallister book, the previous efforts being so entertaining & w/such superb character development. this one was all over the map as i guess even the best writers experience a "hiccup" now & again! certainly NOT worth the price of admission.

It's official, McAllister has lost his touch with furnishing a great golf fiction novel with Eddie Caminetti. After what I would consider to be three very successful consecutive novels in The Green, The Foursome, and Scratch, a new low has been reached. Barranca follows the story of a supposed terrorist (barranca) who monopolizes the coffee market; U.S. citizens panick when starbucks coffee reaches $8. SO what does the US do...good old president Eastwood sends Caminetti to Brazil to negotiate with the terrorist with a golf match. The premise of the novel sounds very intriguing, but McAllister kills it by focusing on various characters within the government that fail to stand out in any way. This static nature plagues a good 3/4 of the novel and Eddie is reduced to a minor character when he gets "captured" in Brazil. What boggles my mind is that Troon completely disregards Eddie's wit and somewhat mysterious ways of winning/rationalizing by reducing him to a mere average golf mortal. We see Caminetti extremely vulnerable in situations, failing to be the dominant source. He loses the caminetti edge, something that defined the novel The Green. The only highlight of the novel comes with the end where Eddie somewhat regains his style, but not in the expected fashion. I was very disappointed with Barranca, but I can only hope the really Eddie will find a way back into literature soon.

I'm not enough of a critic to comment in detail, I just love to read and this book got to me in a big way, not the least of which was the number of my "hot buttons" that MacAllister was able to express a lot better than I could. It's a great story, filled with characters you hate to leave (even the bad guys), and just when you think you know what's really going on, you really don't. I'm going to read all of his other novels as soon as possible, with fingers crossed that they're as good as this one.

I always grimace a little when picking up a sequel to a favorite book (or, in this case, bookS.) The strain to punch out cookie-cutter copies of a winner invariably goes south. But McAllister socks us with a hugely satisfying surprise by forgoing "just another golf novel." He has wisely chosen to stray a little from the links (although there's still plenty of terrifically clever golf action) and take us on a bitingly satirical ride all over the western hemisphere, with my favorite character in all of literature, Eddie Caminetti, flexing his considerable hustle-muscle in remarkable new ways. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED, not just for diehard Eddie fans but the general read who loves intricate plotting and dizzyingly creative writing.