Helpful Score: 1
THE SECRET KEEPER was the March 2013 pick in my online book club, The Reading Cove, and my first time reading Kate Morton.
The story vacillates between 1940s and present-day England, and deals with children uncovering the secrets of their mother's past. I felt the story started off rather generically: at the open, we're in the past with a teenaged Laurel Nicholson witnessing a dramatic event involving her mother, Dorothy; then as an adult in present-day, she's rushing to her ailing mother's bedside to peel away the mystery of Dorothy's life. All very cliché, if you're well-read, you've read this plot a dozen times before.
So the question becomeswill there be any originality in this version? And the answer is...not really. And one of the main issues is the pacing. The plot is beleaguered by overindulgent and long-winded prose. So my eyes were glazing over much of the time, wanting to get on with the plot already!
Seriously, there's enough rambling internal dialogue and tangential exposition to bury any interest I had in what Laurel had witnessed as a child, or what Vivien's and Dolly's and Jimmy's relationship had been about. And in the end, the twist just doesn't make up for taking the reader the scenic route.
Let's put it this way. You could just about read the first 50 pages of this story, then flip to the last 50 without missing much at all. Seriously, half the book is just the narrative apparently being in love with itself! But for a strong sense of character and setting, I give it a C+. I'm still open to trying another of this author's books.
★
(¯`·.·´¯) (¯`·.·´¯)
`·.¸(¯`·.·´¯)¸ .·
×°× ` ·.¸.·´ ×°×
The story vacillates between 1940s and present-day England, and deals with children uncovering the secrets of their mother's past. I felt the story started off rather generically: at the open, we're in the past with a teenaged Laurel Nicholson witnessing a dramatic event involving her mother, Dorothy; then as an adult in present-day, she's rushing to her ailing mother's bedside to peel away the mystery of Dorothy's life. All very cliché, if you're well-read, you've read this plot a dozen times before.
So the question becomeswill there be any originality in this version? And the answer is...not really. And one of the main issues is the pacing. The plot is beleaguered by overindulgent and long-winded prose. So my eyes were glazing over much of the time, wanting to get on with the plot already!
Seriously, there's enough rambling internal dialogue and tangential exposition to bury any interest I had in what Laurel had witnessed as a child, or what Vivien's and Dolly's and Jimmy's relationship had been about. And in the end, the twist just doesn't make up for taking the reader the scenic route.
Let's put it this way. You could just about read the first 50 pages of this story, then flip to the last 50 without missing much at all. Seriously, half the book is just the narrative apparently being in love with itself! But for a strong sense of character and setting, I give it a C+. I'm still open to trying another of this author's books.
★
(¯`·.·´¯) (¯`·.·´¯)
`·.¸(¯`·.·´¯)¸ .·
×°× ` ·.¸.·´ ×°×
Back to all reviews by this member
Back to all reviews of this book
Back to Book Reviews
Back to Book Details
Back to all reviews of this book
Back to Book Reviews
Back to Book Details
