Instruct: Classify a given Amazon review as either positive or negative.
Query: What a dog!

And I don't mean Roger--I mean this whole book! Underdeveloped characters, radical shifts in tone, clumsy plotting, uninspired dialogue, and ham-handed intrusion of the humor columnist's (as opposed to the novelist's) voice in the narrative all combine to sink this book. It was like Barry made up his mind to write a novel, started it, then couldn't wait to get it off his desk. And I can't believe that Barry's buddies Carl Hiaasen and Elmore Leonard, with whom he consulted when he needed help finishing this book, didn't take him aside and tell him it stank; they did him, and us readers who spent good money on this book, no favors by pretending it was good!