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A review by bridgetbrooks
Because of You by Dawn French
2.0
Other reviewers either seem to love this or loathe it. I’m somewhere in the middle having just finished it. It really is the perfect (non-literary) bookclub read as I’m sure it would stimulate great discussions!
It’s very readable as you would expect from Dawn French though at times, I found it ‘over-wordy’ and felt it needed more editing. It’s the first book by her that I’ve read and I picked it because it’s on the Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist 2021 and Bernadine Evaristo seemed to rate it so highly. Mmm!
I certainly found it compelling and had to find out how it resolved itself at the end. However, all the way through, I never really felt that the characters were real. They were just that, characters in a story and one or two were even caricatures. There was high drama and considerable upset requiring a box of tissues at hand, but I felt a bit manipulated to be honest.
So very mixed feelings. How to rate this? Tricky! It’s also tricky to write a spoiler-free review!
It’s very readable as you would expect from Dawn French though at times, I found it ‘over-wordy’ and felt it needed more editing. It’s the first book by her that I’ve read and I picked it because it’s on the Women’s Prize for Fiction longlist 2021 and Bernadine Evaristo seemed to rate it so highly. Mmm!
I certainly found it compelling and had to find out how it resolved itself at the end. However, all the way through, I never really felt that the characters were real. They were just that, characters in a story and one or two were even caricatures. There was high drama and considerable upset requiring a box of tissues at hand, but I felt a bit manipulated to be honest.
So very mixed feelings. How to rate this? Tricky! It’s also tricky to write a spoiler-free review!