A review by amyalicejakob
The Dark Circle by Linda Grant

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? Yes

3.0

This one suffered slightly from my own high expectations of it, and my hope of everything I read being a learning experience. This book looks at the time of the sanatorium, where TB sufferers were institutionalised in huge buildings and told to rest. We meet twin brother and sister, rough as anything, who are the first NHS patients in the previously private abode. I really thought this was going to be exactly my kind of book. However, there seemed to me, to be less factual stuff than character development, which is maybe what normal readers want, but not me. I also felt that there was a lot of telling rather than showing. I felt fairly surprised at the end when we were being told about the level of suffering that each of them felt they had endured, as I learned more about the clothes and lipstick shades than I did their interior lives. 
What I did learn was interesting, but only a dribble and so I left with the feeling that I should have read the wiki page instead and saved myself a few hours! 
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