A review by emjrasmussen
The List by Siobhan Vivian
Mostly, I have heard mediocre things about The List, so I went into it with mediocre expectations. Luckily, it was a little better than I thought. The plot starts immediately, the list being the first thing the reader sees after skimming the short prologue explaining the tradition of the list. There are a lot of different stories and names to keep track of, but you will pick them right up as you go along.
The problem, though, was the way the plots felt completely suspended in space, with no background information to support them and no solid conclusion. At the end of the book, I felt very unsatisfied, and not in a "The author intentionally left the ending open to my imagination" way, but in a “The author didn't care enough" way. All in all, the storyline very intriguing, but the writing is just not very good.
I didn't love The List, but I would say that I liked it; it is an interesting but not very well executed story. Readers who go into it looking for an amazing piece of literature will be disappointed by the detached plots, but readers who are simply looking for a quick, fun read may find The List to be enjoyable. I have not read any of Siobhan Vivian's other books, but if you have enjoyed them, be sure to give this one a try!
This review originally appeared at www.foreverliterary.blogspot.com.
The problem, though, was the way the plots felt completely suspended in space, with no background information to support them and no solid conclusion. At the end of the book, I felt very unsatisfied, and not in a "The author intentionally left the ending open to my imagination" way, but in a “The author didn't care enough" way. All in all, the storyline very intriguing, but the writing is just not very good.
I didn't love The List, but I would say that I liked it; it is an interesting but not very well executed story. Readers who go into it looking for an amazing piece of literature will be disappointed by the detached plots, but readers who are simply looking for a quick, fun read may find The List to be enjoyable. I have not read any of Siobhan Vivian's other books, but if you have enjoyed them, be sure to give this one a try!
This review originally appeared at www.foreverliterary.blogspot.com.