There were a few swear words which I could have done
without.
As a matter of fact, I’m disconcerted at the amount of
swearing included in modern fiction.
After the first few pages of Collins’ ‘The First
Quarry’ I stopped reading the book altogether. The author was peppering the
pages with so many four-letter words that he sounded like a kid who’d just discovered
their existence.
Years ago I read somewhere that people who can’t put
together one sentence without injecting an obscenity were ignorant, uneducated
and inarticulate and could only express themselves in that way.
Current authors, however, have men, women – and possibly
children – swearing like the proverbial troopers. They seem to include it not
because of the type of character they’ve created or the situation the character
is in but seemingly to show that this a tough sort of book.
I would really appreciate it if the publishers went
back to the sometime used practice of marking the swearing words – if the author
really feels he must include them – with asterisks.
I very much doubt that people fluent and addicted to
swearing at all times are reading books. But if they did, they’d have the symbols
to read the book in the way that suits them, while the rest of us wouldn’t feel
our minds being polluted in spite of ourselves.
But to get back to Inspector Montalbano, this is not
that kind of book, though the few four letter words that are there certainly
wouldn’t have been missed if excluded.
It is an original and intriguing mystery, with
delightfully human characters, well-written and plotted.
Connect with Me
Connect with Me
