Tuesday, June 14, 2011

I Can Has Deconstruction?


Trust me, it's worse than it looks. Much, much worse.


I keep a lot of fundymommy blogs in my reader and, for the most part, they are deliriously boring. There's only so much you can say about modesty/cooking/housekeeping/pregnancy/nursing, though they don't seem to mind repeating themselves. Or plagiarism.

Every single one of these blogs has one more subject in common: the Elsie Dinsmore books. Other than the Bible, this is the most recommended book for children in fundydom. I cannot stress this enough (it will be very important later): if you are a fundy in America, you are either reading the Elsie Dinsmore books or you are giving them to your children to read.

So, after the 10,000th mention of Elsie Dinsmore as the book for young Christians, I had a thought: deconstruction. All the cool kids are doing it. I haven't seen another deconstruction of Elsie Dinsmore. I can get the books online for free. I've even read a few chapters of the first book. (Seriously, seriously dreadful.)

So, would you like to read my deconstruction of Elsie Dinsmore? I plan on deconstructing the first book (there are 28, I think) and, if that goes well, several of the later books, maybe the book in which she gets married and book dealing with Elsie and her children. I would appreciate it if you would let me know either way, because the books are just so brain-searingly awful that I don't want to subject myself to them if no one else is interested in the idea.

Just let me know, please. I was going to add a poll, but I couldn't figure out how, so comments it is. Sorry.

22 comments:

  1. I love deconstructions! Count me as a yes vote.

    ReplyDelete
  2. You people hate me, don't you?

    Okay, I'll get to work on the introductory post.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow, that falls into the "Damn, why didn't I think of that???" category. That'd be far more fun than Mike Savage. Yes DO IT!!! DOOOOO IT!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yes pls!

    I think terrible-book deconstructions are my single favorite thing on the internet. What this says about me as a person, I don't know. Probably nothing good. Oh well. In any case, I'm excited!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I'm starting to feel like I need to pick a book to deconstruct if I ever want to be one of the "cool" bloggers. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  6. It was this or Dan Brown, and I just couldn't subject myself to that. If you want to throw yourself on those literary abortions, I will read with glee.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Somehow, I've managed to avoid hearing about Elsie Dinsmore until now. I look forward to learning about her through your pain.
    (Okay, that sounded bad. Um...good luck?)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Dissection! Dissection! We want a dissection!
    Also, I'm having trouble imagining what could be worse than that cover, but still be implied by that cover. I have a feeling this will not be a feel-good experience.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I dig your snark. But feel free to stop when it becomes to awful.

    As a European, I've never heard of that book series.
    Am I guessing right, that fundies want girls to read these books?

    ReplyDelete
  10. oh, yes. other than the bible, this is THE book for little fundy girls. often the ONLY book.

    frankly, i'm glad europeans haven't heard of this series. americans look bad enough already.

    ReplyDelete
  11. A bit late in the game, but yes, oh yes, do eet. I loved your snarking of that online fundy “novel” a while back (can’t remember the title or whatever). Only happy to have more of that.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Yes, do it, do it! It will be horribly fascinating, brilliantly snarky, and rather amusing! (I hope)

    ReplyDelete
  13. I've also not heard of Elfie Dimwater, (I'm selectively and voluntarily colourblind when it comes to absurd amounds of pink, so that's what the title on that cover looks like to me), but it sounds like... err... I was going to write "fun", but that makes me sound like Vlad the Impaler, doesn't it? I solumnly swear on my LORD Darwin I'll do my best not to derive sadistic amusement from your pain. [fist to heart]

    @Joe McKen: Oh yeah, the one with Leona, pregnant teenage vampire slayer. Or something. I was doing an upgraded fanfic of that at one point wasn't I? It fell off the radar when the original ended and I completely forgot about it. :/

    Hopefully I've learned my lesson from that and from the other story I started (set in the Left-Behind universe): if, whilst reading an internet deconstruction of an incredibly crappy novel written by fundamentalist authors, I get the urge to twist the story into a rediculous and completely Over The Top parallel, I have to keep it small and contained or I won't manage to finish it. Or to put it more simply: if I'm going to spend more than an hour or two writing something, it'd better be original-work rather than fanfic.

    ReplyDelete
  14. If you write the review, I'll write the fanfic!

    ReplyDelete
  15. americans look bad enough already.

    Not the ones I've met (former coworkers), some of which I'm happy to be quite good friends with.

    ReplyDelete
  16. I just read the first chapter. Shudder. I look forward to the deconstruction!

    ReplyDelete
  17. One more vote for "I've never heard of this, and I'd love to learn about it from your deconstruction." :)

    ReplyDelete

Comments are for you guys, not for me. Say what you will. Don't feel compelled to stay on topic, I enjoy it when comments enter Tangentville or veer off into Non Sequitur Town. Just keep it polite, okay?

I am attempting to use blogger's new comment spam feature. If you don't immediately see your comment, it is being held in spam, I will get it out next time I check the filter. Unless you are Dennis Markuze, in which case you're never seeing your comment.

Creative Commons License
Forever in Hell by Personal Failure is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at foreverinhell.blogspot.com.