Lexicon

Max Barry
Lexicon Cover

Lexicon

Graham Vingoe
7/28/2014
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Lexicon by Max Barry turned out to be a frustrating read for me considering how much I'd been looking forward to getting into it. The notion of words as literal weapons is an intriguing one but doesn't really get developed sufficiently to feel like anything other than a macguffin- you more or less have to accept on face value that certain words/phrases will compel different character types( in the world of Lexicon the Poets can assign people to different segments based upon their character).

Plot-wise, Lexicon was a little too familiar - it was obvious from early on that certain characters were actually other characters in a different timeframe, so the revelations of these fell flat for me.

more importantly though, you do not get any real indication as to what the Poets overall aim was-it was kept failry ambiguous and that did detract from any feeling of jeopardy.

Overall, then It was a quick easy read but could have been so much more if its potential had been reached.