'This is why I hate you" sporking

Introduction

To start with a quick note, that I think is probably important, I would like to clarify that I read 'This is why I hate you' online for free. If anyone else would like to do this just google "this is why I hate you Onsion free" and you can download the book as a PDF. This is also my first attempt to spork a novel online so if anyone reading this has any recommendations please comment them as I'm sure I'll find them useful.

Let's just jump in to this sewage pit of a book then. I've been planning to sink my teeth into this feited 'novel' for quite some time now and frankly the authors note doesn't tell us much I deem worth covering. It confirms the book wasn't edited professionally but otherwise it's all quite generic.

My name is Arthur Gale. I am a seventeen year old in high school. I'm starting this journal because I feel like no one knows me for who I am. My father is intentionally oblivious to the things I've been going through. Not that I'd want to talk to that balding, delusional, self loathing freak. I have no one to talk to, no one to hear me and not automatically say something dreadfully idiotic in response. This reality leaves me with a void in my life. I need to vent to someone but the problem is I hate most everyone I've ever met.

Is it too soon to state that I would like to give Arthur a kick in the balls? I'll assume it is as first impressions can be misleading; while unlikely it is possible he has simply gone over the top 'venting' as he said. As a seventeen year old myself, this does come across as whiny and pretentious though. All Arthur has done is bitched without giving us any justification as to why we should agree with him- I know he hates his father but I have know idea why I should care about it. Calling him a 'balding, delusional, self loathing freak' sounds incredibly judgmental and as if Arthur can't actually fault his behaviour so he just takes to throwing insults at him instead. Even his claims his father is ignoring his apparent plight are meaningless because they're so unsubstantiated..

The fact that he hates 'most' everyone he's ever met doesn't bode well with me either. Aside from being a ridiculously obvious typo, if you hate that many people the problem is clearly with you. It's not that I don't have empathy for anyone who feels that way, I did myself for a very long time, but the fact that Arthur acts like this has nothing to do with him is ridiculous. I'm sure he'll complain endlessly about this as the story goes on but will he ever take positive action to change it? I think the fuck not.

And that's without even getting into the horrible writing. This opening is fanfiction: the kind written by an edgy thirteen year old who thinks 'Twilight' is the epitome of literature. I shit you not, this is exactly how 'My Immortal' was opened, only it isn't as amusing. This immediately tells the reader that Greg put minimal effort into writing this novel since he didn't care enough to give it a decent opening. The first line of a book should hook you and draw you in! The only conceivable reason I think this might be able to keep someone reading is to check that some poor seven year old's homework wasn't somehow suck in the front page. None of the first chapter even really sets the scene for the story- I don't know where Arthur is, what time period this is set in (though I can guess) or even anything useful about Arthur himself. All this entire first paragraph did was make me want to read this book even less than I did to being with.

How do you express yourself to people when you don't feel they're worth the time?

Eh? Now I don't just want to kick him in the balls I want to saw them off with a chainsaw. If this was phrased almost any other way it would have made him seem like less of a walking member. For example:

'How do you express yourself to people when you've lost all faith in them?'

It's a lousy line that I took about ten seconds to think of but at least it doesn't have the implication that the protagonist thinks he's above the plebeians surrounding him. It doesn't even sound like he's putting any effort into expressing himself so it's impossible to care about any of his issues. In one line Greg's made his main character seem like he's a self pitying snob who takes a passive role in solving his own problems. How he thought this would be good characterisation for a character we aren't meant to loath is beyond me.