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A review by meghanfulmer
The Other Side of the Bridge by Camron Wright
3.0
Ugh. This book was disappointing.
Camron Wright is the author of The Rent Collector, which is a book I recommend to almost anyone who loves to read. I was so excited to see that Wright is coming to speak at a local bookstore, and The Other Side of the Bridge will apparently be the book of focus for that night; I immediately downloaded it and began to read, expecting great things.
This book is really about two people. The first is Katie, whose father worked on the Golden Gate Bridge (and also saved many people from jumping to their deaths there), and who has now been assigned to write about the history of the bridge. The second character of note is Dave, who experiences a devastating family tragedy and becomes fixated on driving across the Golden Gate Bridge on a motorcycle.
Parts of this book were interesting to me. I liked learning the history of the bridge, and Dave's story gripped me much more than Katie's. However, the unifying element of the bridge, and how it was supposed to hold the "answers" for the two main characters, never really seemed to come to fruition. Dave's story had a satisfying ending, but the bridge thing seemed weak and out of place. I think his story could have had the same outcome without getting the bridge involved at all. Katie's story, frankly, didn't have much closure, but there wasn't much for which to provide closure anyway because her story didn't have much to it. Besides doing her research and healing some wounds regarding her father, nothing really seemed to *happen* in her story.
I was expecting something monumental like The Rent Collector, and this book fell short of those expectations. The unifying backdrop of the bridge just didn't work for me.
Camron Wright is the author of The Rent Collector, which is a book I recommend to almost anyone who loves to read. I was so excited to see that Wright is coming to speak at a local bookstore, and The Other Side of the Bridge will apparently be the book of focus for that night; I immediately downloaded it and began to read, expecting great things.
This book is really about two people. The first is Katie, whose father worked on the Golden Gate Bridge (and also saved many people from jumping to their deaths there), and who has now been assigned to write about the history of the bridge. The second character of note is Dave, who experiences a devastating family tragedy and becomes fixated on driving across the Golden Gate Bridge on a motorcycle.
Parts of this book were interesting to me. I liked learning the history of the bridge, and Dave's story gripped me much more than Katie's. However, the unifying element of the bridge, and how it was supposed to hold the "answers" for the two main characters, never really seemed to come to fruition. Dave's story had a satisfying ending, but the bridge thing seemed weak and out of place. I think his story could have had the same outcome without getting the bridge involved at all. Katie's story, frankly, didn't have much closure, but there wasn't much for which to provide closure anyway because her story didn't have much to it. Besides doing her research and healing some wounds regarding her father, nothing really seemed to *happen* in her story.
I was expecting something monumental like The Rent Collector, and this book fell short of those expectations. The unifying backdrop of the bridge just didn't work for me.