THE PLOT (Jean Hanff Korelitz) - March 11/23

 This one really petered out for me. I really enjoyed the first half, with its emphasis on Jake's rise to fame and his tentative relationship with Anna. But around the midsection I started losing interest as Korelitz began stressing Jake's somewhat tedious investigation. And then the fairly ludicrous finale stretch, complete with an absurdly monologuing villain, really didn't work for me. It's also a ridiculously long book, too, but I guess I didn't hate it anyway. **1/2 out of ****