Pages: 304
Date Finished: February 4
Book club finished about an hour ago, so here is my review.
I am surprised that the cover of this book was not a picture of a woman with heaving bosoms and a shirtless man with abnormal abdominals. Once the author ceased to explain the raving lusts of our main characters, and settled down to the mystery of would she or wouldn’t she kill her husband, I rather enjoyed the book. Certainly it was full of detail, and description and everything else that a good historical mystery romance needs. Did the husband kill his first wife? How much of this was planned ahead of time? How did the son manage to find the father’s advertisement?
But there were many things about the book that I didn’t appreciate. I understand that a man wrote the book. I also understand that men think about sex a lot of the time. I do not really need this illustrated so violently or graphically. I don’t want to read about someone else’s dirty thoughts for a hundred pages. Or if I did, I would go to the romance section. I did like the reason behind his lustful thoughts; his mother was a crazy person. To not love a child because you can see the sin inside them, or to stab them with a pin to illustrate the suffering waiting for them in hell: that is just plain crazy. I can understand his predisposition towards sin with memories like that to begin his life with.
I can certainly admit that the writing in the book was captivating. I don’t have to like the story itself to appreciate the skill involved with writing something with that level of description and detail. And there were portions of the book where I was impressed by the insights that he was able to draw in these characters. For example, and the beginning of the book our heroine has this thought, which struck a chord with me, as well as many of the women in my book club:
“She believed in the miraculous. Or she had, until she reached an age when, all of a sudden, she realized that the life she was living was, in fact, her life…it shocked her now, like a slap in the face" (17).
However, when there are sections of text like this on page 151:
He put her hand on his sex and held it there. She felt it move beneath her hand, now soft, pliant as a fish, rising and falling like breath, “Swear.”
“I promise you.”
He got up, grabbed a towel and began to clean himself off. There was a wet pool in the bed where he had been. He never came inside her. He was terrified of children.
The twists and turns of the book are very transparent. You can see each revelation, and I didn’t find very many of them shocking even when they occur. I am glad that I read the book until the end, but the ending of the book is flat, and feels very rushed. I would have liked the book better if there had been more time given to the part of the story after Catherine’s return from St. Louis, and less given to the sexual repression and then sexual exploits of these characters.
I also think it would have been interesting to have the book narrated by different characters, rather than only Ralph and Catherine. Just an idea. It incited a lot of discussion from the book club, which to me is the mark of a good book club book, if not necessarily a book that I would give to other people.
As a side note, I just want to mention that I hate the interview portion in the back of books these days. It is dumb. I don’t really want to know these things about the author, and quite frankly often the author comes off as either pompous and self-absorbed, or they sound much less eloquent than their book. Both of these things are understandable, and I can’t blame the author either way. If someone cam to interview me right after I found out I was publishing a book I would be very excited to talk about my book and my ideas. And if I was put on the spot I would certainly sound less intelligent than I would in a book that I spent tons of time revising and fixing. Nevertheless, I wish that publishers would stop doing this. If I wanted to read more things from the author I would go to their website, or read other books.
Good Reading,
Caitlin
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