tell one story well

The Thin Place by Kathryn Davis

Rating: 2 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction

Review: Multiple perspectives can do wonderful things for a narrative. When it's done well, it can help flesh out the story and give the reader more insights than can be garnered from a single character. When it's done poorly, or haphazardly, multiple perspectives only serve to impede the flow of the story, and can confuse the reader.

Such is the case here, where Davis gives us the perspective of many characters, including several of the pets in the small town in which her story is set. Here, the multiple perspectives have the effect of muddying the waters so that the reader can never gets a clear picture of any of the characters and can never know what's important to the story.

It's too bad that Davis never lets any one character's story come through fully, because she gives us several interesting threads. One character can bring people and animals back to life, but only under certain circumstances. What circumstances? How does she feel about her ability? Occasionally we feel as though we may be getting close to delving deeper into one perspective, but than Davis tears the story away to another character, or perhaps gives us a horoscope or something from the local police blotter. The effect is a very jerky, frustrating read.

major melodrama

A Call from Jersey by P.F. Kluge

Rating: 2 stars (out of 5)

Genre: historical fiction

Review: The entire time I was reading this book, I felt like I was missing something, like it was the sequel to a book I hadn't read. Relationships were written as though there was a lot of tension between characters, but nothing was developed enough (either in the backstory or the present story) for me to really care about where the tension came from, or whether it got resolved. Most of the characters seemed to just drift through the story, occasionally colliding with each other in encounters that were evidently supposed to be very weighty, but really just seemed like random plot devices. I think Kluge was aiming for high drama, but only managed to give us melodrama.

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

don't mess with a good thing

Adam & Eve by Sena Jeter Naslund

Rating: 2 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction

Review: I had high hopes for this book, because I've enjoyed Naslund's previous books, especially Ahab's Wife and Abundance. Unfortunately, this book was a grave disappointment. It seems like Naslund was trying to do something a little different with Adam & Eve. The result is dialogue filled with non-sequiturs, plot points that are left dangling, and characters who say and do things with no apparent motivation or that are directly at odds with what they have said and done previously (with no accounting for the switch). Although Naslund is to be praised for trying something new, I hope that in her next book she will return to the style that has previously served her (and her readers) so well.

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

heavy-handed

The Good Daughters by Joyce Maynard

Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: historical fiction

Review: Maynard's premise in this book is an interesting one. Unfortunately, her efforts to be coy about that premise result only in heavy-handed foreshadowing that really leaves very little to the reader's imagination. Given how much she gives away, it seems that what was really important was not what the big secret was, but how the characters would react once they found out. That being the case, I wonder why Maynard chose to frustrate the reader by giving away almost the whole thing through less-than-subtle hints rather than just telling the reader what happened in the beginning and letting the story focus on the characters and how learning the truth changes (or doesn't change) their lives. There are a few details that are left unanswered until the big reveal near the end, but it wasn't enough to maintain any sort of narrative tension.

Once I got beyond the fact that there was no mystery where it seemed like there was supposed to be one, I was able to enjoy this book. Maynard's descriptions of her settings are beautiful, and I did find myself caring about the characters and how they would deal with finding out the truth. Unfortunately, the lovely prose does not make up for the narrative shortcomings.

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

nothing new

Still Missing by Chevy Stevens

Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction

Review: There is very little that's original in this book, which is a shame because it's quite well-written. But overall, it's a fairly standard abduction story, told from the point of view of an adult abductee. There are a couple of plot twists thrown in along the way, both during the time she was abducted, and once she returns, but overall her reactions and thoughts are a little too predictable. Combine the vivid and compelling writing with just a little more of something to distinguish this story from other abduction stories, and it could have been a really good book.

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

interior vs. exterior

Small Island by Andrea Levy

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

Genre: historical fiction

Review: When an author chooses to write a novel in the first person, they make a choice about the voice of the novel as a whole. The interior dialogue of a narrator must match their exterior dialogue. If the two don't match up, it detracts from the credibility of the character and the overall readability of the novel. The disparity between inner and outer voice is especially striking when the character speaks in dialect, as is the case here. The narrative switches among 4 characters, two native Englishpeople, and two who have moved from Jamaica to England. One of the Jamaicans speaks in a strong dialect, while the other is quite proud of her "King's English" even though she often finds that English shopkeepers don't understand a word she says. And yet the interior voice of both of these characters is largely the same as each other, and the same as the other two narrators. I found this disparity distracted a lot from the story.

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

set pieces

After This by Alice McDermott

Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: historical fiction

Review: All in all, I really liked this book. The slow, languid pace somehow fits the story perfectly. My one complaint is that the story treats time almost like a stone skipping over water. At the end of one chapter, two people meet each other, and at the beginning of the next, they are married with three children and a fourth on the way. Then, suddenly, we are another 5 years or so in the future (references to WWII and the Vietnam War anchor the story generationally, but there's very little to give solid reference points as to how much time has passed from one point in the story to another). I understand that all the day-to-day details of family life are not the point of this book, but I did find it more satisfying when McDermott allowed us deeper into the lives of the Keane family rather than just skimming the surface.