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A review by lorrietruck
The Children's Book by A.S. Byatt
2.0
I think I liked the idea of this book the most - a sprawling novel about intertwining families in the lead up to the First World War. In reality, it didn't quite live up to what it could have been.
I found the characters hard to distinguish from each other, the children and the men anyway. None of them seemed to have any real disctinct personality traits to distinguish themselves from one another. And none of them were particularly likeable. In fact, the more you knew about the characters, the less you liked them. The most affecting part of the book for me was when the two Robin's were killed and, besides the circumstances of their birth, you don't really learn that much about them throughout the novel.
I found the historical sections of the novel to be quite boring, not gripping at all, and often skipped them. The name dropping of historical figures throughout the action of the novel didn't feel genuine at all.
I really wanted to like this book. I just didn't!
I found the characters hard to distinguish from each other, the children and the men anyway. None of them seemed to have any real disctinct personality traits to distinguish themselves from one another. And none of them were particularly likeable. In fact, the more you knew about the characters, the less you liked them. The most affecting part of the book for me was when the two Robin's were killed and, besides the circumstances of their birth, you don't really learn that much about them throughout the novel.
I found the historical sections of the novel to be quite boring, not gripping at all, and often skipped them. The name dropping of historical figures throughout the action of the novel didn't feel genuine at all.
I really wanted to like this book. I just didn't!