LO'S DIARY

The surnames have been changed -- Humbert Humbert to Humbert Guibert and Dolores Haze to Dolores Maze -- but that doesn't exonerate this cheesy literary gimmick that retells Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita from its 12-year-old namesake's point of view. Published in the U.S. only after legal wrangling with the Nabokov family (it was published in Italy in 1995), this rehash of the 1955 masterpiece drags down Nabokov's blackly satiric vision, set in atomic-age suburban America, to the level of a cynical 1990s teen sex comedy. More heart and less libido might have given this baby vixen's whiny, monotonous narration an extra dimension; as is, it's flat, unfunny, and obviously written by an adult. D

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