BOOKS 2013: October

[bottle_of_smoke]

99. The Mermaids Singing - Val McDermid
'You always remember the first time. Isn’t that what they say about sex? How much more true it is of murder

Comments

[apiphile]

How did you find Life Class? I genuinely couldn't make myself finish it and I still can't work out what the problem was. I'd be interested to hear your view.

[bottle_of_smoke]

I liked it well enough at the time but very forgettable, especially in comparison with Regeneration. Like, I read it last month and I had to remind myself on Amazon what happened because I couldn't remember. I loved the writing, as usual: her descriptions, particularly of sex, are always so spot-on. I also really loved the ambulance driver stuff - lots of medical horror which I shouldn't have such an interest in as I do, but I do. But plot-wise and character-wise it just wasn't as strong a book as, well, Regeneration. Again. (Very little is, and I feel bad for comparing.) It didn't tear out my insides like those books did, and I want that from my WWI literature.

[apiphile]

Yeah I think it was a bit... tamer? Less perilous? Less frightening and tense? And I want, more than anything, my WW1 books to hurt, like you said.

Also thingy, the girl... was no Sarah Lumb.