A review by tomaxhull
Antarctica by Claire Keegan

  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

Several of these stories were excellent - deft with language, capturing small details of life (especially life in Ireland, and the tense relationships between men and women) incredibly vividly. I was gearing up to give it 4 or 5 stars. Then one felt weirdly racist:
dropping the n word, through character voice, but not remotely necessarily -- and seeming to depict a black man being accused of rape in a way you assumed would lead somewhere and was instead left ambiguous.


Huh, I thought, maybe I missed the point. Then another one was also casually derogatory about black people, in character voice. Then the final story in the collection, about a child going missing,
mentioned her being enticed away by a black stranger. This detail appears to have no relevance, and what actually happened is not resolved.
I... what? What's going on here? Really weird. I wish I could recommend this work but I truly can't.
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