An Object of Beauty

I had heard Steve Martin was actually a pretty decent novelist a while ago, I don't remember where. Then I kept seeing his most recent novel, An Object of Beauty. One of the places I saw it was on my brother's girlfriend's e-reader this past summer and I asked what she thought of it. She said she liked it so I put it on my ever-growing list of books to read. My mom picked up a used copy a month ago (with my urging) and I finally got around to checking it out.

It's a hard book to review because I more or less hated it the entire time I read it. I didn't feel anything for the main character, Lacey Yeager, a driven art dealer. The plot line seemed more or less nonexistent, which doesn't bother me so long as I care about (or at least am interested in) the characters--and in this case, I didn't. Yet I pressed on due to the recommendation and I will say I liked how it ended, enough that I was satisfied that I had read the book. But I can't offer much of a recommendation as the book does a poor job of captivating the reader, unless the reader is someone extremely interested in the New York art scene. I saw the book is being turned into a movie, which is surprising as not too much happens in the book. (Though it is being produced by none other than the author himself, so that might be how that happened.) I suppose though that it might be easier to make the story into a two hour movie than a 300 page book and I'm guessing the movie version will be better.