Citizen Reader

I thought I'd shake things up a bit in my continuing quest to read all of Ian McEwan's novels, so I got Amsterdam* as a book on CD and have been listening to it. And now, on the fourth and final CD, I can confidently say...

I have no idea what the hell is going on in this book.

Well, that's not true. I've just about figured out which character is Clive, and which one is Vernon, and how they're both semi-involved with getting pictures of a cross-dressing politician published in the newspaper. Oh, and there's also something about a woman they both loved, Molly, and how she was involved with the cross-dressing politician, and that's why Clive and Vernon want to take him down.

Okay, when you can't keep two main characters in mind, you know you're just not following the audio book. So now my question is, am I just not enjoying the book, or do I just not enjoy listening to novels? Usually, when I listen to books, they are nonfiction books, I'll admit. And when I listen to books, I'm typically doing the dishes or cooking--evidently I don't have enough brain power to both follow a storyline AND scrub plates? Interesting.

So I'm going to do a little experiment; I got McEwan's book Saturday on tape, and I'm going to try that too. Maybe it's just Amsterdam. Maybe it's just McEwan. Or maybe it's any fiction on tape. I'm going to find out!

*I was just reading about this book at Amazon, where I was reminded that this is the book for which McEwan won the Booker Prize. What? My long tradition of not enjoying Booker Prize-winners continues. Which hurts me, because it's a British award, and as such, I should be all over it.