Such allusions to a story that doesn’t, in fact, yet exist are no substitute for the real thing and therefore will not get the author (indolent goof-off that [s]he is) off the proverbial hook

Page 11 of a novel:

I’m back in produce, though, honestly, I don’t remember what caused me to drift back there.

Does … someone else?  The author maybe?  Also, have you just established that you are sometimes going to lie to me?  You’re a $7.99 drugstore mass market paperback thriller, for gods’ sakes, but if you want to rock the Unreliable Narrator, I’ll put you on probation to try it.

Page 12:

Though recently, for reasons I can’t explain, it has begun to fade.

Could you … try to explain them?  Seriously, you’re all I’ve got connecting me to the story here.  You can’t take a nap onstage and then leave it to the reader to figure out the deep haunting majesty of your hazy pretensions.  Especially given the prose of the first ten pages.

She gets five more pages, and then I’m out.

[title]