Instruct: Classify Amazon reviews into positive or negative sentiment
Query: Quick, but depressing read

This book is a rigidly light-hearted portrayal of a woman, Caroline, trying to figure out what she should be doing. Married to an academic, and dissatisfied with being a housewife she attempts to fill her time by reading to residents at a retirement home. Her husband becomes very interested in the individual that Caroline is reading to, and steals a manuscript to further his research.The cynical disrespect and disregard that Caroline, her husband, and all the characters exhibit for ethics or pretense of social feeling is no doubt intended to amuse. Since her best friend is a hedgehog-fancier one cannot help but imagine that this is supposed to be a comedic story. Perhaps it is the distance in time (the book was published posthumously in 1986), but rather than humorous the characters are repellent, the plot depressing, the racism irritating. This is the type of book that might be interesting when published, but is quickly outmoded.