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Only as high as a 3 because it's Celine, and because the historical context is interesting. I would not recommend this book to any but fairly serious fans of Celine's work, it's a bit of a slog.

I am beginning to suspect that Oscar was basically Harold Lauder, but written as a fully developed character, sympathetically. And of course with the multigenerational Latino style à la Isabelle Allende or Gabriel Garcia Marquez... like basically Stephen King rewritten by an author with talent, remixed through Los Bros, Marvel and DC comics. It's pretty meta.

Stephen King is an utter hack. His characters lack depth, his descriptions are sometimes so jarring that you lose your sense of place while reading, his dialogue is forced, and his stylistic devices are so heavy-handed it almost feels like he might be kidding around. But plot? Yeah, he can write a plot. This is yet another classic King potboiler. To be honest I read it more for the post-apocalyptic setting and was a bit disappointed when it turned into yet another Stephen King book with the mystical what-have-yous but whatever, it was a page-turner, I read it, and there were some good images in there and it was fun to read.