A review by irurian
The Owl Killers, by Karen Maitland

1.0

I've read about half of this & that is more than enough for me. I hate to abandon books, but I can't see any point in continuing on.

Firstly, I thought that the writing was poor. Every chapter is told from the point of view of a main character, but I felt like none of the characters were distinct enough for it to work. Additionally, the writing itself was very heavy-handed at times, which I believe detracted from the overall story.

Pacing was also an issue. It seemed as though nothing of substance had actually happened by the time I decided to abandon the book. Perhaps the author was going for a slower burn than I wanted, but combined with no interesting characters, I was bored out of my mind.

Just really disappointing, since the concept of the book was so promising. The struggle for power over a relatively unimportant town with competing ideologies is a fascinating concept. Unfortunately, the execution just wasn't there.