Having said that...

Here's a review I came across in Entertainment Weekly, which, despite what people may think, has darn good book review coverage. (See, people, if we cast books as just another form of entertainment, people will buy them; if they are medicine you're supposed to take, people won't.) I know I just complained about Allegra Goodman being "a little jihad-y" in her op-ed piece about writing, but it's time for me to issue a fatwa of my own. Here's an excerpt from the review: The tale of the haunted schoolteacher ''Pete Ferry'' (yes, it's also the author's name) Oh for Christ's sake. This is over, people. No more. Valis, with not one but two author dopplegangers, Philip K. Dick and Horselover Fat, came out in 1974. Borges meets his future self in a hotel room in a story he wrote in 1977. Philip Roth appears as a character in at least one of his books. People strangely thought it was innovative when Jonathan Safran Foer did the same thing in 2002. This is not an original or fresh or interesting trick anymore, people. It's not cutting edge or clever or anything but an annoying cliche, but it's not an old enough cliche to be interesting when you dig it up. Writers of the world! Let's retire this gimmick for at least ten years! Please!