A review by bootrat
Private Rites by Julia Armfield

Did not finish book. Stopped at 53%.
I liked how queer this was, but honestly I hated all of the characters. I couldn't bring myself to care about any of the characters, they all felt basically the same and I kept getting them all mixed up as the POVs switched, and none of the book hit for me. Also it felt very similar to Our Wives, with another weird water thing happening (especially when there was a reference to a website where people were fantasising/roleplaying about life in the before times, which felt the same as the website in Our Wives where people were roleplaying having husbands lost/trapped in space). I kept persevering hoping it would improve, but honestly I should have DNFd after the first hour.

I really wanted to like this book because I really enjoyed salt slow, but I hated Our Wives Under the Sea so I think maybe I only like Julia Armfield's short stories and I need to stop trying with her longer books.

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