The Seduction of Water

Yuck. This was a book club pick. It illustrates how hard it must be to write a good novel. Goodman seems to have what you would think you'd need: a cast of characters that aren't 2-dimensional (though maybe not quite 3D), a well-described setting or two, a complicated plot spanning decades, personal/family mystery, geopolitical intrigue and artsy literary technique (using fairy tales as metaphor). She puts a sentence together adequately, though not artfully. And yet it adds up to zilch, blech, ugh.