Wednesday, August 17, 2011

narrative by implication

When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman
Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)
Genre: fiction
Challenge: 100 Book Challenge 2011
Review: There is a lot of sex in the beginning of this book, most of it witnessed, which is good (or at least better than the alternative) since the main character, Elly, is a young girl.  Other sex is implied, making it difficult to know what actually happened.  I found this to be a very frustrating way of story-telling, since so much of Elly's character is supposedly shaped by this implied sex.  This is not the only piece of the story that is told through implication.  Elly's relationship with another character takes on importance in adulthood that is does not seem justified by what is revealed to the reader in her childhood.  I almost felt as though a critical scene has been edited out of the book which would explain how Elly came to be so close to this character later in life.  In the end, this book required too much guesswork for me.

FTC Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for this review.

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