The Portrait - Iain Pears

This is probably the most pointless book I've read in ages. It is written as a monolgue between a portrait painter and an arts critic.
This seems like an interesting device but not in this particular author's hands. I was bored, and was not engaged by the two characters. Because it was a monologue I couldn't picture the second person - I couldn't engage with either of them. I didn't care about why the critic was about to be murdered, and taking 210 pages over a simple matter of pregnancy and suicide appears excessive. This is not a well written or constructed book. My rating 2/10