Helpful Score: 4
What a devastatingly depressing novel; you'll not leave this one believing life is rosy or good, that's certain. I feel like I've been internally flooded out and now the roads inside me are impassable.
The characters became increasingly difficult to differentiate and I found it frustrating for the last thirty or so pages. On paper, they're all the same: girls, women, mothers, aunts, daughters, grandmothers who've had horrible things happen to them and who are trying to salvage something from their pathetic lives. I liked Mabel and Daisy and that was it. I have a strong suspicion that's because they kept to themselves. The other characters were all up in each other's business and boy, did they make a human wreck of their lives.
It became exhausting to read about horror after horror happening to these people and I just couldn't take the cycle of stupidity that none seemed capable of breaking out from. Rainey, especially, repulsed me with her lack of good decision-making skills and half-attempts at mothering. I felt sorry for her kids.
Bertie would have done well to have gotten over her eighth-grade-self and read the stupid letter and allowed Mabel to be her guide. But you can't help stupid and arrogant, as Bertie shows. Mabel really lucked out, I guess, by not having to be saddled with such craziness. No wonder Alma wanted to be so far away from her.
The characters definitely inspired strong feelings in me, which is good, but they weren't likeable because they didn't seem to have any gumption or redeeming characteristics.
The characters became increasingly difficult to differentiate and I found it frustrating for the last thirty or so pages. On paper, they're all the same: girls, women, mothers, aunts, daughters, grandmothers who've had horrible things happen to them and who are trying to salvage something from their pathetic lives. I liked Mabel and Daisy and that was it. I have a strong suspicion that's because they kept to themselves. The other characters were all up in each other's business and boy, did they make a human wreck of their lives.
It became exhausting to read about horror after horror happening to these people and I just couldn't take the cycle of stupidity that none seemed capable of breaking out from. Rainey, especially, repulsed me with her lack of good decision-making skills and half-attempts at mothering. I felt sorry for her kids.
Bertie would have done well to have gotten over her eighth-grade-self and read the stupid letter and allowed Mabel to be her guide. But you can't help stupid and arrogant, as Bertie shows. Mabel really lucked out, I guess, by not having to be saddled with such craziness. No wonder Alma wanted to be so far away from her.
The characters definitely inspired strong feelings in me, which is good, but they weren't likeable because they didn't seem to have any gumption or redeeming characteristics.
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
