When you like the writing but hate the characters

Last month’s book was called “On Beauty”, for those who do not know this, I am in a book club, and the main reason I joined was to read book I would not normally chose. This particular reading circle is very gay and very varied; we all have strong opinions and tastes. So far we have only read 4 books, so we are just getting started, and we take turns choosing what to read. For December, the Imelda chose the latest Zadie Smith book, which I had wanted to rea, but never really got to it. So I went home with it and read it. It was an easy task after all when you are flying 9 hours each way and you are home, just waiting on people or doing errands you have time to read. I finished the book in about 2 weeks, and I liked the writing, I thought the book was written very well but the staory had big flaws and I could not care about any of the characters – with the exception of one. I know she won the Orange Price for fiction with it, and was short listed for the Booker, but seriously some of the story lines just faded away and some were irrelevant. But it was writing was very good, and enjoyable and easy to read and deep and funny and sad at times. Unfortunately that was just the writing, the characters were all, crazy and petty and not likeable at all. Sow what do you do? How do you praise a book you enjoyed reading but you felt nothing about? How do you say this is a good book, based on grammar and structure alone?

I guess this is why I joined the book club to read more of these books, and less of books that I know I will like because they agree with my point of view and my life’s experiences. Still I have no answer to the questions above, except to give a mixed review.