A review by gadicohen93
Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

3.0

This book began with great promise but ended up really frustrating me. The long twisting run-ons that piled on cause and effect one after the other, though they invigorated the writing at first with their sense of surprise and trust in the narrator's omniscience, started to feel gimmicky, random, empty of real power, almost a ploy to stun the reader with a final surprising phrase after a game of word association. The rarity of scenes and dialogues, which at first set up the fable-like atmosphere of the plot, then started feeling lazy, like the writer could only advance the plot through summary rather than drama.