Umberto Eco, Lousy Novelist

Thereâ??s no hiding it: Umberto Eco is a lousy novelist. Try as one may, it is difficult to make sense of his new novel, â??The Prague Cemetery.â? As is often the case with him, the plot is built as a mystery of sorts, on this occasion the quest to discover the true author of â??The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,â? an anti-Semitic pamphlet that remains one of the worldâ??s biggest hoaxes and whose true author remains unknown. Oddly, Eco is less interested in solving the puzzle than in incensing his readers. The protagonistâ??s anti-Semitic rampage, running through hundreds of pages, appears to be a parody. But the joke is impossible to decode. Worse, it isnâ??t funny!