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lindy_b 's review for:
The Last Neanderthal
by Claire Cameron
The narratives we choose to construct around Neanderthals and how those narratives have changed over time fascinate me because they're usually semi-veiled ways of talking about race and racism, so that's why I read this book. And on that level The Last Neanderthal certainly provides plenty of material worth discussing. I wouldn't describe my reading experience as fun though.
Perhaps because I was already reading this allegorically and because most things we think we know about Neanderthals have been disputed at one time or another, I didn't mind that Cameron took significant creative license with the parts of the book set in the Paleolithic. However, I found the parts set in the modern day to be unbearable. Rosamund Gale is about as believable as a paleoarchaeologist as Indiana Jones, and doesn't come across as very bright. So that's where my suspension of disbelief stops, I guess.
I thought Cameron's prose seemed stilted and choppy, but that's probably a taste thing.
If you don't know as much about paleoarchaeology and human evolution as I do, you might be able to enjoyThe Last Neanderthal, but I couldn't.
Perhaps because I was already reading this allegorically and because most things we think we know about Neanderthals have been disputed at one time or another, I didn't mind that Cameron took significant creative license with the parts of the book set in the Paleolithic. However, I found the parts set in the modern day to be unbearable. Rosamund Gale is about as believable as a paleoarchaeologist as Indiana Jones, and doesn't come across as very bright. So that's where my suspension of disbelief stops, I guess.
I thought Cameron's prose seemed stilted and choppy, but that's probably a taste thing.
If you don't know as much about paleoarchaeology and human evolution as I do, you might be able to enjoyThe Last Neanderthal, but I couldn't.