A bit disappointing

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jliao Avatar

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Locust Lane - 3.5/5, rounded up to 4/5. I think I had high expectations for this book because it was compared to Celeste Ng's Little Fires Everywhere, which I loved. Similar to the Ng book, a big aspect of it was concentrated on examining big themes likes privilege and power and influence and how those affect each of the character's lives. There are secrets. They get revealed. I found myself often...confused by what I'm reading. I am not always exactly sure of what is happening on the page, and I find myself looking for clues in the next few pages or re-reading sections to try and understand. There are also these....whispers...of magical realism that seems a big incongruous with the overall book. I either wished it had slightly more presence or that it would've been foregone altogether.

The story begins with a character driving late at night when he hits a dog. He goes out to explore, to see if the animal is ok, and the dog is .. aggressive? Then he seems to see something out of the corner of his eye, but the dog ends up chasing him to his car, and he is unable to investigate further. The whole scene is like looking through murky water... just shrouded in something.. but you're not entirely sure what. The whole rest of the book ended up like that for me.

I was also really unhappy with the ending. That was a low point for me. I am GLAD that we get to discover what really happened with the murder, but the way everything played out made me want to scream. I do think that there was intention to it -- it carries on the larger themes of the book, after all-- but I still felt disappointed by how it all ended!