A review by weneedtotalkaboutbooks
Sorry to Disrupt the Peace by Patrick Cottrell

4.0

Sorry to disrupt the peace is a highly literary novel, with some darkly hilarious moments, that reflects on grief and mental health. 

Helen, the first-person narrator, is a 30 something korean woman, adopted when she was a kid by a highly religious white american couple. Helen is confused about her sexuality and place in the world, but strongly opinionated. When she receives a phone call from an uncle informing her that her adoptive brother has taken his own life, Helen decides to drive back to her hometown to support her adoptive parents (but mainly to find some sort of personal validation) and to find out more about what brought her brother to take his own life. 

This is a story densely written from the POV of an unlikable, unforgiving and mentally unstable main character. We are following her stream of thoughts, sometimes spiralling in daydreaming, flashbacks and reflections on life and human behaviour. 

(A personal pet peeve is the absence of quotation marks in dialogues, but that’s a very personal point. I find it visually less tiring and more engaging when the author decides to keep the quotation marks, which isn’t the case in this novel)

In conclusion, Sorry to disrupt the peace seems to be polarising between readers. I am somewhere in the middle, closer to the 4/5 rating… I might need to reflect on it for a few days before making a final decision. 

Some people compared it to Eileen by Moshfegh, which I personally don’t see, but I understand that the link is the unlikable narrator with strong ideas about the world and others. If you like how this sounds, and are looking for a deeply reflective, sometimes moving and often darkly funny novel, I’d suggest you to read the first pages of this book.

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