A review by trop_de_livres
Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin

challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

After previously finding The Stepford Wives less than well-written, I decided to give this one a try after listening to a podcast about the movie. I went in with a different attitude when reading it, not expecting a brilliantly-written book but instead imagining it as a script with stage directions. The sparse writing makes more sense and I found certain sentences less annoying that way. ("Good," Margaret said. "Take care of yourself." "I will," Rosemary said. "You too, Margaret." "I will. Good-by." "Good-by.") I would normally stop reading a book if it were written like that but thinking about it as a play was the perfect solution. Even though I basically knew how it would end it kept my suspense and attention and I enjoyed it. There are some unfortunate racist things that were most likely not considered racist at the time and there is a 
rape scene
 which is obviously essential to the plot but very upsetting.  I was born in Year One myself so this made the novel more intriguing to me, to think my parents were having their first child the same year as Rosemary and Guy. Since I was raised in a 
Catholic family where the devil is considered to be real
  this made it even more creepy.
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