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A review by jamiee_f
A Flaw in the Design by Nathan Oates
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
Gil is a married father of two girls, and his estranged sister just died in a tragic accident, leaving her troubled 17 year old son Matthew behind to come live with Gil and his family.
Years ago, Gil swears Matthew tried to drown one of his daughters on a family vacation. Matthew's parents defended him and the family relationships crumbled. Now Gil is living with a potential murderer in his home, and the boy has enrolled in his creative writing class as well. Gil becomes obsessed with figuring out what Matthew is up to, and things escalate once Matthew submits 'fictional' stories of his cousins and parents deaths. Gil starts to spiral and act erratically, and he is in reasingly convinced Matthew arranged for the death of his parents.
Culminating in a tense confrontation where Gil plunges into the water, falling of a bridge. Matthew covers up the incriminating details and makes it look like a convincing suicide.
The book ends with kind of a triple twist...first twist is when we seemingly get confirmation that Matthew did kill his parents and pay off the Albanian hit man. Second twist is when Gil falls/is pushed off the bridge and Matthew makes him disappear, so Matthew can go on to college to write a novelization of this whole story. Third twist is when we cut to a long term recovery ward, where a mysterious patient has just woken up...and can finally communicate that his name is Gil.
The story here was good. I was curious to see if the uncle was an unreliable narrator, it felt like we were moving in that direction! Gil was clearly becoming more unhinged, making bad choices. I was annoyed that he ended up with no proof of Matthews crime confession story because he couldn't find the scanner wire?? As if all the characters don't have smart phones. I could believe our spiraling protagonist wouldn't think to take pictures of the story, except 1) he talks his wife he can't scan it and she is fully lucid and 2) he considers taking pictures of pages earlier in the book! A stupid plot hole. Additionally, the like twist/twist/twist ending felt like it was only done for shock value. The recovery ward story created more questions and almost set up a premise for a sequel? Which feels kind of cheap. We also never get any answers as to the boys motivation. Why did he kill his parents? Is he just a run of the mill sociopath? Did something happen to him? If not, I guess this is just a heavy handed indictment of rich families from Manhattan? IDK there were a lot of ques ions that did not resolve well. I don't like when a book is wishy washy, commit to a premise! Either the nephew is evil for some reason, lying to everyone and a master manipulator, or the uncle is fully delulu and it was an unreliable narrator tale. It felt like the author tried to split the difference here which was not very effective.
Culminating in a tense confrontation where Gil plunges into the water, falling of a bridge. Matthew covers up the incriminating details and makes it look like a convincing suicide.
The book ends with kind of a triple twist...first twist is when we seemingly get confirmation that Matthew did kill his parents and pay off the Albanian hit man. Second twist is when Gil falls/is pushed off the bridge and Matthew makes him disappear, so Matthew can go on to college to write a novelization of this whole story. Third twist is when we cut to a long term recovery ward, where a mysterious patient has just woken up...and can finally communicate that his name is Gil.