I bought this book long before I knew Moz liked it, based on the title and cover art alone. My copy has an image of an angel statue on the cover, which caught my eye. I read the first sentence and I was hooked.
I plunged right in and all of a sudden all these lyrics began sprouting out of the page. I got all tingly....and I thought, I bet Morrissey has read this.
This was well over 10 years ago, and I had just started to look for web sites about Moz on the Internet. I found one that had a list of literary references in his songs (I cannot for the life of me remember which site it was, or if its still around). I didn't see Elizabeth Smart mentioned anywhere, so I compiled my list of quotes and song lyrics and sent the webmaster an e-mail. He hadn't heard of the book before and he sent me a thank you and posted all my references, and I thought that was really really cool.
Mind you, I'm sure Morrissey had mentioned the book before in interviews, or someone else had noticed it before me, but I never knew til I read it and it was like a special discovery....
Anyway, I personally
love the book.
But I love things that are done on a grand and dramatic scale. It's biblical in proportion, yeah, you could say its too much, but for me it isn't. I like the passion, the murky depths of it. It's one long passionate dirge. And never dull.
I've read it many times, and I always pick new things out of it to love.
I say get it