Paulo, Oh, Coelho! or The Reader Stands Alone

He has a wonderful name. Very romantic. Paulo Coelho. It’s only natural that I like it, as I love Romance languages, I’m a Romanian. But when it comes to his books, and I admit only reading 2 of them, 11 Minutes and The Winner Stands Alone, I don’t think I’ll ever be tempted to start another one authored by him. “The Winner..’’ is the one I’m going to talk about since I just finished it. And it will probably be the briefest review I’ll ever write (am I being too optimistic?).
This book confirmed again the ‘’De gustibus non disputandum’’ dictum, I guess (sorry for the tongue twister). It must be a good book since I read it with quite an excitement probably caused by the successfully woven detective novel plot. A psychopat rich guy (which adjective goes first? And it’s not a grammar but an existential question!) decides to randomly kill people at the Cannes festival where he knows his ex-wife is present, just to draw her attention that he wants her back. In his view, anything is Ok as long as it's in the name of Love, even destroying whole worlds. He is the owner of an international phone company, so I guess the business might have run much smoother, without bloodshed, had he just picked up the phone and left a few voice mails. Alas, that cannot be recounted in 341 pages, that’s true. And then, he does have some cuckoos in his attic caused by his heroic participation in the Afghanistan war where he learned how to kill without remorse. The whole action happens only within a day - 4 victims, I think-, so I have to admit, he’s good at suspense and keeping my attention. The criminal manages to escape of course, and the morale is, well, a lot of bad guys get away with crime nowadays, so, bravo, realism at its best. Other than a successful plot, I feel I didn’t get much out of this book. He really tried, maybe too hard, to write more than a detective novel. He wanted to depict a modern kali yug in which stars of the show biz fall prey to an insatiable will for power: actors, fashion models, couturiers who all want to make it and forget when it’s time to stop and enjoy the simple things in life, like love and family. The problem is this craving-for-power-leitmotif gets repetitive and it loses its charm over 300 and more pages. Moreover, instead of him lecturing me on Power and the mortal traps it might set for people chasing it, I would have preferred to see it reflected in the way characters acted.
Another thing I don’t like about Coelho is his lack of language artistry. He’s blunt like my kitchen knives. How could he ever touch me? Not to mention he writes a short summary of his book together with the ‘philosophy’ behind it on the VERY first page. I mean, WTF, it’s like during an exam, the Professor gives you the answers to the problem you’re then ‘trying’ to solve. It only shows he’s afraid he’s going to lose his job, so he’s being a little bit ‘lenient’, poor kids need to make a future. Read as uncle Coelho needs to sell his books. To anyone. So, thanks to God, he tends to the less cultured ones by telling them what the book they’re going to read is about. Because, eventually, at home, the Reader stands alone.

PS. By the way, he has a blog. Please visit and discuss the depths of his work with other fellow enthusiasts.