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A review by anna_hepworth
Death Leaves the Station by Alexander Thorpe
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.5
As a debut novel this book shows promise, and individual scenes are great, but they didn't add up to a cohesive whole. Similarly for the plot - there are some great plot threads, but they weren't woven together in a way that worked for me. It didn't help that there were some (potentially) anachronistic details that threw me out of the story, and made me wonder if they were deliberate choices on the part of the author, or just ignorance. Despite that there are some really good subtle historical details woven through though. The Catholic vs Protestant nastiness in particular (there is a lovely plot detail that hinges on this difference, although I don't think it is clearly articulated that that is part of it).
In terms of characterisation, there was a range from somewhat wooden stereotype through to quite believable. Where some of the dialogue had the potential to get bogged down the author has opted for a meta-textual 'well, this bit was long and drawn out, I shall summarise'. Which I kind of appreciate, but also, I'm willing to suspend disbelief for a more condensed bit of dialogue in this kind of story.
Descriptively, it goes hard on visual details that might help some to visualise, but did rather baffle me. And then the writer has the gall to talk about driving distances in the bush with 'nothing to see'. Reads like a city person, made me decidedly grumpy. People I know who live in that type of country don't talk about it that way (even if it would have taken longer to travel through). Having said that, some of the details for one of the towns is meticulous, so it may well be someone writing about their home town, and I'm over-interpreting.
And yet, the thing that probably annoyed me the most was the ending. It is obviously being set up as the first of a series, with the unnamed friar solving things in ways that are obviously modelled on Agatha Christie's Poirot. Unlike Poirot, it didn't feel clever, it felt clunky. The fact that two of the people were even in that room (including the friar) makes no sense. And it was here in particular that the plot threads didn't come together coherently. It was both too farfetched and too pat.
Overall, I think this book could have done with at least one more draft, with balancing out some of the plot elements so that they aren't all dropped on the reader in a lump, and possibly some fact checking (or an afterword that says 'these are the details that sound implausible, but this is where I got them from').
In terms of characterisation, there was a range from somewhat wooden stereotype through to quite believable. Where some of the dialogue had the potential to get bogged down the author has opted for a meta-textual 'well, this bit was long and drawn out, I shall summarise'. Which I kind of appreciate, but also, I'm willing to suspend disbelief for a more condensed bit of dialogue in this kind of story.
Descriptively, it goes hard on visual details that might help some to visualise, but did rather baffle me. And then the writer has the gall to talk about driving distances in the bush with 'nothing to see'. Reads like a city person, made me decidedly grumpy. People I know who live in that type of country don't talk about it that way (even if it would have taken longer to travel through). Having said that, some of the details for one of the towns is meticulous, so it may well be someone writing about their home town, and I'm over-interpreting.
And yet, the thing that probably annoyed me the most was the ending. It is obviously being set up as the first of a series, with the unnamed friar solving things in ways that are obviously modelled on Agatha Christie's Poirot. Unlike Poirot, it didn't feel clever, it felt clunky. The fact that two of the people were even in that room (including the friar) makes no sense. And it was here in particular that the plot threads didn't come together coherently. It was both too farfetched and too pat.
Overall, I think this book could have done with at least one more draft, with balancing out some of the plot elements so that they aren't all dropped on the reader in a lump, and possibly some fact checking (or an afterword that says 'these are the details that sound implausible, but this is where I got them from').
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism
Moderate: Death
Minor: Homophobia, War