Scan barcode
A review by henrymarlene
The Trivia Night by Ali Lowe
3.0
I’m in two minds about ‘The Trivia Night”. On one hand, it seemed like a very loose rehash of Little Big Lies, with stereotypical blond Caucasian school mums in a snooty coastal suburb who either have the most practical part time flexibility or are dressed for a Lorna Jane commercial. I don’t understand the attraction of the yummy-mummy, and the fact that every woman was vying to be an alpha. The recklessness of all of the characters was almost instantaneous in that fateful evening – how all of their stars and chakras aligned for all of them to jump right in just so was perplexing. And I’ve never seen so many parents available for a School assembly. The end was written to be the last shock to the system however I think it was a little flat. The reveal about Zoe’s sister was more of an emotional moment for me.
On the other hand, it was a tightly paced book that had a good rhythm of action, and blended in multiple points of view from counselling session notes to emails to a silent character. It provided very big personalities who were all ones to be judged by both reader and other characters. There were relationships that were entering shaky ground and it is not all smiles and botox. There are some deeper issues that are explored here, such as alcoholism and domestic violence, went though they are lightly sprayed on and dealt with quite quickly in the last quarter of the book. And that last quarter was also not what I had expected and was a little bit more malicious and sociopathic.
On the other hand, it was a tightly paced book that had a good rhythm of action, and blended in multiple points of view from counselling session notes to emails to a silent character. It provided very big personalities who were all ones to be judged by both reader and other characters. There were relationships that were entering shaky ground and it is not all smiles and botox. There are some deeper issues that are explored here, such as alcoholism and domestic violence, went though they are lightly sprayed on and dealt with quite quickly in the last quarter of the book. And that last quarter was also not what I had expected and was a little bit more malicious and sociopathic.