Review: The Smallest Minority
26th August 2019
Kevin D. Williamson has written a great book, full of sharp observations and tying everything together nicely.
He then squatted and emptied his bowels over the result, leaving no page unsmeared. I’m sure he breathed a great sigh of relief when he was done, but that doesn’t help those of us who are presented with the result.
Seriously – I couldn’t finish it. Like trying to eat a steak that had been boiled in cat urine, eventually you get to the point where you ask yourself ‘Why am I doing this?’. It’s just not worth it.
Look, I like Kevin Williamson. He hates a lot of the same people I hate, and he’s a very clever writer when he can resist the urge to make his opponents his spittoon. I don’t even mind his reflexive Trump Derangement Syndrome in most cases; like most of the National Review crowd, he can’t bear to live with the fact that some rube from Long Island has succeeded in doing many of the things that St Ronald Reagan couldn’t, and the dyed-in-the-Buckley snobbery is about all that the NR remnant have left. Kevin can be an excellent writer when he can repress his literary Tourettes syndrome, but in this case he apparently didn’t even make an effort. I’m a Navy vet; I can take strong language if it’s appropriate to the situation, but this I-can-be-more-Twittery-than-thou performance is just a good read spoiled.
Don’t waste money buying it. Get it from a public library if you have to. Photocopy the pages, go over it with a black marker redacting where Kevin decided to leave no potty-mouthed slur unspewed, and you’ll wind up with a delightful read (if you’re willing to go to that much work), having shrunk it by about a third.