The Devil's Dancer by Victor Bertocchi is an interesting book which simply misses the mark. There are some highs, some lows and a lot of "meh".

A couple people have commented that they might have simply "not gotten it" but I think they are being unfair to themselves. There isn't really a lot to get. The satire, such as it is, is fairly straightforward and, frankly, didn't make me care. I didn't care about the characters, I didn't care about the social commentary, I simply didn't care. The writing was fine and I have no doubt that some will find the humor more appealing than I do, but it won't be because anyone did or did not "get it."

As the previous paragraph makes clear, a narrative work (novel, play, movie, even poetry) needs to get some kind of buy-in from a reader/viewer or it is just an exercise for the writer. Satire is no different from a thriller or a romance in that regard. If I don't care about a character I need to care about the satirical points being made. If neither the characters nor the satire are interesting or compelling then reading becomes a chore to simply keep turning pages. This book wasn't that bad, I found myself turning pages to get to the next chuckle. It was just that they were far and few between.

I would probably recommend this to someone who likes satire and does not mind that it is neither complex nor particularly a narrative. Like any work but perhaps even more in humorous satire tastes vary so I hesitate to be too negative.

Reviewed from a copy made available through Goodreads First Reads. ( )

I received this book from a giveaway in exchange for an honest review.

O.K., I do not review books often, so bear with me. I will say first that this book is one you have to get used to. It is written as a script for a play, which at first threw me off. Also, there are a lot of characters. A LOT. Whatever you do, do not skip the first pages introducing the characters, or you will get lost fast. That being said, I did actually enjoy this book. It took a few chapters for the story to get going, but after that it was a fairly enjoyable read. ( )