we are getting up at 5am. that is how desperate we are to leave.

[fahye]

WHO HAS TWO THUMBS AND IS GOING HOME TO SYDNEY TOMORROW?

THIS GIRL

And just in time, too: yesterday I was forced to buy a whole other book (Mary Renault's The Charioteer; thanks to apiphile for piquing my interest there), and then I devoured said whole other book and now I am, once again, out of books. Luckily I have Sarah Water's Affinity and the last book in the Baroque Cycle waiting for me back in Sydney.

HOME AGAIN HOME AGAIN, JIGGITY JIG

Comments

[fahye.livejournal.com]

I ADORED the first half of it, tried to slow down my reading and catch all of the language-use, adored the characters and the subtlety and the sense of time & place... but I found the second half left me feeling very underwhelmed. The use of understatement and omission and metaphor became less precise, and it got to the point where I no longer felt like I knew Laurie well or understood his motivations (rational or emotional) for doing any of the things he did. I wasn't hoping for one outcome or other, I was hoping for an outcome that made sense and left the story feeling finished. But instead it left me feeling slightly depressed, and mostly -- flat.

Which is such a pity! Because I have dogeared some pages to go back and reread and think about more, and I found her writing style to be generally beautiful.