Customer Reviews

A Jealous Ghost

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If a book makes you irritable and grumpy (or, if irritability and grumpiness are emotions that are projected onto a certain text...) is it a sign that the book is confrontational or that it is simply bad? "Poorly executed" was the (possibly incorrect) reviewerism that sprang to mind after i finished this book. If A.N. Wilson had been motivated to represent the disabling effects of long-term study on the human psyche, or the morally ambiguous implications of contemporary theory for the ways in which we perceive our reality, then this could have been an interesting piece of work. Unfortunately Wilson correlates the perception of non-normative sexuality with a murderous pathology. Thankfully this book is short and easy to read. I read "A Jealous Ghost" under the advice of Anita Brookner, for its association with Henry James and for the romantic connotations of postgraduate study and the UK. Denial helps me to forget how easily i am seduced by the superficial. However, prospective readers are warned that the type of self-analysis that ensues from succumbing to these vices should be productively sought elsewhere.