Truman Capote spent six years working on "In Cold Blood," and agonized over the fact that he couldn't fairly publish it until there had been a conclusion to the story. This attitude is rare these days; most writers seem to want to strike when the iron is hot and don't always care if the ending is neatly tied up in a bow. Such is the case with "Second Coming," and the book suffers greatly as a result. A sequel to "The Jordan Rules" by the same author, the book is endlessly fascinating and makes for good reading. But I have two elephantine complaints. The first, referenced above, is that the author just couldn't wait to spill everything about the behind the scenes drama and dysfunction; thus, the book was prematurely finished after Jordan returned from baseball for a few games at the end of the regular season in 1995 and the failed playoff run. The story of Jordan's return did not end there! He went on to win titles the next three years in a row. It is not an academic complaint; the whole tenor of the book is informed with the notion that the comeback was suspect based on its lack of immediate success. It would have been a dramatically different book if Smith had waited even a year to publish, after the Bulls won a record number of regular season games and a championship! This leads naturally into my second--can't be overstated--criticism: the implication that Jordan was washed up after his return from baseball. While Smith never comes right out and says this, the vapor is in the air, and "Second Coming" proves that the pressure to "publish or perish" can lead to the death instead of a good idea.
Buy "Second Coming" on Amazon
No comments:
Post a Comment