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A review by jkkb332
Company of Liars by Karen Maitland
5.0
This book was so much creepier than I expected. I read a big chunk of it alone in a quiet house late at night and I was definitely on edge. I loved that about it, and a lot of other things too. I love how many times it surprised me with a twist, how it kept me just off balance enough that I didn't figure any of them out (but looking back, I can see the foreshadowing woven in so subtly and neatly). The characters were a mixed bag. Some were easy to root for. Some were tragic but annoying, and a few were just terrible, but still well developed and interesting. There were a lot of interpersonal dynamics at play in the group and Maitland did a good job of exploring them.
The pestilence was almost a character in its own right. It hunted them, haunted them. I've never read a book about the plague but what a terrifying, grotesque world to live in. I thanked the stars repeatedly that I live in the 21st century and don't have to deal with traveling in the cold rain, on foot, for months on end, or village streets filled with shit and filth, or rats in my bed, or wolves hunting me, or accidentally stumbling over a dead body and dying of the plague later that day.
The last thing I love about this book is that I'm descended from a line of Maitlands, so if this had sucked it would have been extra disappointing.
The pestilence was almost a character in its own right. It hunted them, haunted them. I've never read a book about the plague but what a terrifying, grotesque world to live in. I thanked the stars repeatedly that I live in the 21st century and don't have to deal with traveling in the cold rain, on foot, for months on end, or village streets filled with shit and filth, or rats in my bed, or wolves hunting me, or accidentally stumbling over a dead body and dying of the plague later that day.
The last thing I love about this book is that I'm descended from a line of Maitlands, so if this had sucked it would have been extra disappointing.