Review by alicroz34 - The Accidental

alicroz34 's review for:

The Accidental by Ali Smith

4.75

challenging mysterious reflective slow-paced

Ali Smith is one of the most incredible writers I have ever come across. Her ability to play with form, while never making it feel superficial, is amazing to me.

For this particular copy, whoever at the Observer called this book "sexy" and whoever at the publishing office decided to put that on the cover? You two? You call me. Let's talk about those choices. Y'all are wild.

My favourite quotes included:

Ducks actually have their own road sign! There is a sofa warehouse called Sofa So Good. It is dismal. There is a church. The church has its own roadsign too. Nothing happens here except a church and some ducks, and this house is an ultimate dump. It is substandard. Nothing is going to happen all substandard summer.

Any minute now she would step back through the door into the room.

There she was now, in the doorway.

It keeps getting dark when it's light, he says. I mean, when it's not meant to be dark.

Does it? Amber says.

She thinks about it.

Persistence of vision, she says. You must have seen something so dark that it's carried on affecting your vision even though you're not looking directly at it anymore.

But how? Magnus asks.

Exactly the same as if you saw something too bright, she says.

The dead weren't the problem. The dead could look after themselves. Eve was beginning to grieve for the living.

Content Warnings