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A review by branch_c
The January Dancer by Michael Flynn
3.0
This is a tough one for me to review. There's no doubt that it's meticulously constructed and sophisticated. The main story is interesting and creative; the writing is polished and, as I said about the one previous Flynn book I read (Eifelheim), even erudite.
The problem for me though, was that the various threads of the plot were just too complicated to easily follow, and this blunted the excitement that should have carried the story forward. The reader, it seems, was intended to pay careful attention to every detail, and be rewarded for figuring out the subtle twists and deceptions that wind through this book. Is that too much to ask of the reader? Probably it shouldn't be, but I don't consider myself a lazy reader, and in this case yeah, it seemed it was a bit much.
The revelation at the end, by the way, was one of the best parts of the story, but that was the one thing I don't think the reader was intended to see coming. If we had gotten some better hints about that earlier on, it might have made it more worth the effort to keep track of things; as it was, it ended up being an elegant but minor flourish on a somewhat tedious read rather than a crowning finale to a glorious adventure.
The problem for me though, was that the various threads of the plot were just too complicated to easily follow, and this blunted the excitement that should have carried the story forward. The reader, it seems, was intended to pay careful attention to every detail, and be rewarded for figuring out the subtle twists and deceptions that wind through this book. Is that too much to ask of the reader? Probably it shouldn't be, but I don't consider myself a lazy reader, and in this case yeah, it seemed it was a bit much.
The revelation at the end, by the way, was one of the best parts of the story, but that was the one thing I don't think the reader was intended to see coming. If we had gotten some better hints about that earlier on, it might have made it more worth the effort to keep track of things; as it was, it ended up being an elegant but minor flourish on a somewhat tedious read rather than a crowning finale to a glorious adventure.