A review by nlord
Low Town by Daniel Polansky

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

While I wouldn't usually mind Polansky's brand of cynicism, this one skews way too far into "Dark-and-Gritty", with a lot of the "Grimy Noir flavour" racism and bigotry being seriously unpleasant to read (especially everything about Kirentown and it's crime-boss), beyond that, you would easily guess the culprit way, way to early into the story (If you ever before read a detective story or two), for the rest of it feeling frustrated by how the whole mystery could've been solved in minutes, if only characters exchanged slightly less vague sentences between each other once in a while.