A review by gladiolus17
Chlorine by Jade Song

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I really found my niche. Literary horror is the best kind of horror around. 

Chlorine is a grotesque, reflective, visceral novel that consistently pushes you to the edge of discomfort and does not let up. It is not one of those novels that goes 0 to 100, it is 100 all the way through. 

My eyes were sutured to the page. Could not put this book down. I’d even sneak pages of it at work!

This book pushed right up to the limit of too much but sometimes went over, making it hard to suspend my disbelief. It’s just a small thing, but your mileage may very, and my judgement is subjective. For example:

“Yes! My mom and I love her. I’m thinking about playing ‘胡思乱想’ for the walk-out.” 

“What did you say? Who sah loon? Did you sneeze? Bless you.”

I realize that this is about micro-aggressions but I’m not sure any non-Chinese speaker would mistake 胡思乱想 as a sneeze, unless this was supposed to be a joke and I interpreted it wrongly. 

But really these instances were small and did not affect my enjoyment of the book. I absolutely loved Chlorine and will be looking forward to Jade Song’s other books. 
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