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A review by lezreadalot
Yellow Crocus by Laila Ibrahim
3.0
Love saves this book. And by that I mean kinda saves it. And by that I mean sorta saves it. And by that I mean saves it in the most rudimentary way. Because you can tell a lot of love went into researching and writing this novel, and it's honestly very very lovely. I've had my beef with books written about slavery before (especially those written by non-black people) and Ibrahim brings a lot of heart into Mattie and Lisbeth's story that's often lacking from historical and fictional narratives including slaves. Their bond was beautiful and their story tugged at the heartstrings.
But this was not well written in the slightest ahaha. POV shifted clumsily. The narrative moved like a flat line with a few bumps here and there. This contains some of the worst dialogue I've ever read; no one in this book sounded like a human being. The writing was just... writing. This year, I've been trying to do a thing where I begin each review with a quote from the book that I liked, but I can't do that here, because nothing in the writing jumped out at me, and there's just nothing written in this book that I couldn't find written better somewhere else. Moving things happened in this novel, but it was written in such a way that I was not moved in the slightest.
I listened to the audiobook as read by Bahni Turpin, who has an incredible voice and gave a pretty well rounded performance. I'm going to be looking out for more work narrated by her in the future. She only changed her voice slightly for each different character, but it was distinct enough that it really worked. And she did her best with the terrible dialogue, though I can't say she improved upon it much.
This is another book that I wanted to love way more than I actually did.
2.5 stars. (The extra .5 almost SOLELY because I couldn't bear to give this the same rating as I gave that Sue Monk Kidd book. And for the narration of the audiobook.)
But this was not well written in the slightest ahaha. POV shifted clumsily. The narrative moved like a flat line with a few bumps here and there. This contains some of the worst dialogue I've ever read; no one in this book sounded like a human being. The writing was just... writing. This year, I've been trying to do a thing where I begin each review with a quote from the book that I liked, but I can't do that here, because nothing in the writing jumped out at me, and there's just nothing written in this book that I couldn't find written better somewhere else. Moving things happened in this novel, but it was written in such a way that I was not moved in the slightest.
I listened to the audiobook as read by Bahni Turpin, who has an incredible voice and gave a pretty well rounded performance. I'm going to be looking out for more work narrated by her in the future. She only changed her voice slightly for each different character, but it was distinct enough that it really worked. And she did her best with the terrible dialogue, though I can't say she improved upon it much.
This is another book that I wanted to love way more than I actually did.
2.5 stars. (The extra .5 almost SOLELY because I couldn't bear to give this the same rating as I gave that Sue Monk Kidd book. And for the narration of the audiobook.)