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anna_hepworth 's review for:
The Murders of Molly Southbourne
by Tade Thompson
dark
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
To be fair to Thompson, I had no idea what I was getting myself into with this book. I bought it because I love the Rosewater books, and other people have been saying good things about it.
The opening chapter of this book makes no sense on first read. However, near to the end of the book something became horribly clear, and I had to go back and reread that chapter. Given that it is the framing narrative of the whole story, it shouldn't have worked. And yet. I recommend people read the book before reading any reviews.
Although novella/novelette length, this is a lush and convoluted story with so much detailed world-building and characterisation leaked to the reader a droplet at a time. As a horror story, it works on multiple fascinating levels. The surface level body horror is flagged in the blurb on the back of the book. Some of that can be quite visceral.
But in the background is a barely recognised societal and environmental collapse happening. The little bits of that the creep in are sadly entirely credible as the way that life is going.
The opening chapter of this book makes no sense on first read. However, near to the end of the book something became horribly clear, and I had to go back and reread that chapter. Given that it is the framing narrative of the whole story, it shouldn't have worked. And yet. I recommend people read the book before reading any reviews.
Although novella/novelette length, this is a lush and convoluted story with so much detailed world-building and characterisation leaked to the reader a droplet at a time. As a horror story, it works on multiple fascinating levels. The surface level body horror is flagged in the blurb on the back of the book. Some of that can be quite visceral.
But in the background is a barely recognised societal and environmental collapse happening. The little bits of that the creep in are sadly entirely credible as the way that life is going.