Helpful Score: 1
This book is difficult for me to review because although the writing is lovely and the characters are fantastic I did not care for the story beyond the first part. I don't want to give anything away but I just did not understand the choices some people made, which drove the direction of the narrative.
Helpful Score: 1
In 2021, Chris Whitaker's We Begin at the End became one of my Best Reads of the year, and he's repeated himself with All the Colors of the Dark. Whitaker has a talent for creating compelling stories featuring exceptional thirteen-year-old outsiders. In this book, it's Joseph "Patch" Macauley, a boy who loves pirates, and his best friend, Saint Brown, who convinces her grandmother that she wants to become a beekeeper.
All the Colors of the Dark begins with Patch's traumatic rescue of a young girl being attacked by a serial killer and follows Patch, Saint, and others through to 2001. I think what grabs me most about Whitaker's writing is that he has such a gift for making me feel all the emotions of his characters, and sometimes that is exhausting.
I want to talk about this book for pages and pages, but I don't want to risk spoiling anything for anyone else. All the Colors of the Dark is part missing persons mystery, part serial killer thriller (in which the serial killer is more shadow than substance), and part love story. It's a tale of obsession, and-- above all-- a tale of hope.
Read it.
(Review copy courtesy of the publisher and Net Galley)
All the Colors of the Dark begins with Patch's traumatic rescue of a young girl being attacked by a serial killer and follows Patch, Saint, and others through to 2001. I think what grabs me most about Whitaker's writing is that he has such a gift for making me feel all the emotions of his characters, and sometimes that is exhausting.
I want to talk about this book for pages and pages, but I don't want to risk spoiling anything for anyone else. All the Colors of the Dark is part missing persons mystery, part serial killer thriller (in which the serial killer is more shadow than substance), and part love story. It's a tale of obsession, and-- above all-- a tale of hope.
Read it.
(Review copy courtesy of the publisher and Net Galley)
Helpful Score: 1
âI just wanted to show you that sometimes things survive despite the harshest of odds.â
My experience with All the Colors of the Dark was unique because I read it while on two overnight Amtrak trips when I felt like I was the only passenger awake on the train. So I feel a unique kinship with these characters whose long journey (from age 13 to 39 through 600 pages) accompanied me on my actual journey.
I loved We Begin at the End, the author's previous novel, for its complex, deeply flawed characters and spare writing style. The characters of All the Colors of the Dark are equally compelling (and flawed) but I didn't connect as strongly due to its length. The middle was repetitive and lagged in pacing, and some suspension of disbelief is necessary to embrace the plot. I usually appreciate short chapters, but this has more than 250 of them, which felt excessive and often abrupt.
The sense of place for most scenes was strong, and unsettling in the best ways. I'm fascinated that a British author sets novels in the United States, but I'm not sure why because I've read many books by American authors set in England and other countries.
I'm glad I read this and I'm interested in the author's next book, but I hope it's more like We Begin at the End. I'm grateful to Crown Publishing for providing a review copy of this novel.
My experience with All the Colors of the Dark was unique because I read it while on two overnight Amtrak trips when I felt like I was the only passenger awake on the train. So I feel a unique kinship with these characters whose long journey (from age 13 to 39 through 600 pages) accompanied me on my actual journey.
I loved We Begin at the End, the author's previous novel, for its complex, deeply flawed characters and spare writing style. The characters of All the Colors of the Dark are equally compelling (and flawed) but I didn't connect as strongly due to its length. The middle was repetitive and lagged in pacing, and some suspension of disbelief is necessary to embrace the plot. I usually appreciate short chapters, but this has more than 250 of them, which felt excessive and often abrupt.
The sense of place for most scenes was strong, and unsettling in the best ways. I'm fascinated that a British author sets novels in the United States, but I'm not sure why because I've read many books by American authors set in England and other countries.
I'm glad I read this and I'm interested in the author's next book, but I hope it's more like We Begin at the End. I'm grateful to Crown Publishing for providing a review copy of this novel.
