Why I Won't Read This...

 James Patterson; "The Last Days of John Lennon" 

First, it's a collaboration upon which Patterson, as a well-known name has put his stamp to improve uptake, no doubt.

I found this in the library and - speaking as a John Lennon fan (I can recall the exact moment and feeling when I was informed of his death by Debbie Atherton in Grimsby College of Technology at 8.40 am Monday December 9th 1980). I did a bit of research and it had only two takers over six months.

Another review (https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/james-patterson/the-last-days-of-john-lennon/) states:    

"To their credit, the authors at least don’t blame Lennon’s “Happiness Is a Warm Gun” for egging on the violence that killed him, but this book pales in comparison to Kenneth Womack’s John Lennon 1980 and Philip Norman’s John Lennon: The Life, among many other tomes on the Fab Four.

A thimbleful of fresh content lies buried in tales familiar and often told."

At least they could bring themselves to read this book.

I think my issue is that this is too near to the knuckle for me. It smacks of a lazy attempt to capitalise on a gory event enacted against a complex, possibly over-lioned figure. However, Lennon, for all his flaws actively rebelled against what the Clash called 'phony Beatlemania'. 

Roy Palen of Book Reporter is kinder:

"THE LAST DAYS OF JOHN LENNON will provide a welcome walk down memory lane coupled with tears of regret as we watch how someone so evil could deprive the world of someone who did, and would have continued to do, so much good."

https://www.bookreporter.com/reviews/the-last-days-of-john-lennon

I am reasonably certain Lennon would have dismissed such a book as this as opportunistic, ghoulish and exploitative. 

Patterson claims his use of invented dialogue puts him up there with Mailer:

“I took a little license,” says Patterson. “I learned that from Norman Mailer. If it’s good enough for Norman, it’s good enough for me. They’re minor liberties based on interviews [others did] with Chapman and things that he said. Certainly, it’s directionally right, I think. I’m not a purist, but I wanna be as accurate as I can be.”

https://www.wbur.org/news/2020/12/04/james-patterson-last-days-of-john-lennon

But, unlike Patterson, Sherman and Wedge, I'm going to avoid just inventing peoples' thoughts to pad out the viscera, and make out it's Pulitzer Prize-worthy stuff..