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3.59 AVERAGE
3.59 AVERAGE
Looking Glass Sound is a masterclass in narrative fiction. Ward's deft, hand-crafted, detailed, slow-burn narrative leaves you reeling with twists and turns.
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
The first third of this book was 5 stars but it’s petered out after that. If the details of the first portion had been expanded and the story ended with Nat’s dad being the killer and it being unknown who took the polaroid pictures I would have been happy.
I loved the theme of who owns the story but when the Pearl narrative was introduced, I felt like the layers of story within a story had gone one step too far.
This was my first read of this author and I would try another book.
I loved the theme of who owns the story but when the Pearl narrative was introduced, I felt like the layers of story within a story had gone one step too far.
This was my first read of this author and I would try another book.
The Last House on Needless Street is one of my favorite books, and I enjoyed Sundial as well. I had high expectations for Looking Glass Sound, particularly in the areas of world building and plotting, and these were mostly met. Ward has a wonderful, galloping writing style that sweeps you from one vivid scene to the next without it seeming jarring, despite the fact that this book has numerous transitions between eras and the characters who are narrating. Other reviewers have nicely summarized the wildly twisty plot, so I will not re-hash the plot arc here, but I do have a reflection on the use of queer narratives in the text. Ward uses sexuality, curiosity, and queer erotic tension to build suspense in her plot, which is understandably effective. In places, the novel reads like The Secret History or These Violent Delights, which have wonderfully rich queer subtexts. However, readers who are hoping for a similarly three dimensional realization of Looking Glass Sound’s queerness may be disappointed. Specifically, Nat and Wilder’s nascent attraction simply serves to create conflict that propels the eventual discovery of the barrel women. Wilder and Sky’s romance, while delightful for about 50 pages, is also cut short when we realize that we are now in a different book where the genders are reversed. At the end of the book, we come to realize that the female protagonist, Pearl, has changed the gender of herself and Wilder in The Sound and the Dagger to “try to see it from his side.” Then, inexplicably, in Pearl’s version of Looking Glass Sound, Wilder is a middle aged man who is in the process of divorcing a woman.
In short, I think it would have been possible to maintain the desired plot structure while not continually changing the sexual orientation/gender of the characters, which made a sensitive, fully realized queer romance impossible to sustain (and also made the characters’ queerness a “gimmick” to propel the plot in places).
In short, I think it would have been possible to maintain the desired plot structure while not continually changing the sexual orientation/gender of the characters, which made a sensitive, fully realized queer romance impossible to sustain (and also made the characters’ queerness a “gimmick” to propel the plot in places).
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The first half or so was enjoyable enough. That story should have been fleshed out a tiny bit more and it could have made a solid novel. What it turned into was... not a solid novel. It dragged on, becoming ever more convoluted and pointless, until it introduced fantastical elements at the end to cap it off with an even more pointless air because then it lacks even a small feeling of "this could be true."
If it were literary, or deeply meaningful, or something like that... I'd give it a pass. But any depth here is only an illusion; it's not a sound, it's a puddle. The writing quality itself was fine but nothing great (I kept noticing sentences near each other with awkwardly repeated words).
Books should either be a) entertaining b) thought-provoking or c) both. The first half of this book was 3/5 stars on A and the rest of the book was zero stars on all. I regret buying this book.
If it were literary, or deeply meaningful, or something like that... I'd give it a pass. But any depth here is only an illusion; it's not a sound, it's a puddle. The writing quality itself was fine but nothing great (I kept noticing sentences near each other with awkwardly repeated words).
Books should either be a) entertaining b) thought-provoking or c) both. The first half of this book was 3/5 stars on A and the rest of the book was zero stars on all. I regret buying this book.
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
What a wild ride?! I’m left feeling not sure what’s real and what’s fiction in the best way possible. Catriona Ward is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors!
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A