All Unquiet Things by Anna Jarzab
My rating: 3/5 cats
this is a really high three stars cats, because i really did like it a whole lot. my only reservations about going the whole four are that i know i will never read it again. five stars cats means i neeeed to reread it, and four stars—its chances are good that it will be revisited. but this is a mystery, and i am not the sort of person who has any interest in rereading a mystery once i know whodunit.
but it has a lot going for it.
it takes its title from childe harold, so already it’s got me interested. my love of byron conquers all. he leadeth me beside the still waters and all of that.
also, this is a YA split narrative where both characters sound like different people. hallelujah! an author that can handle the challenge of creating distinct characters! you would think this would be child’s play for an author, but i am finding more and more that many are just not up to the task. this one is great for that.
this book also has a great twin peaks-y vibe. carly was murdered a year ago, her uncle has been jailed for the crime, but her cousin audrey (daughter of convicted murderer) and her ex-boyfriend neily are unconvinced that he is actually guilty. looking into her past, questioning people close to her at the end of her life, and reading her journal, they find out all kinds of sordid information about her that she kept very well-hidden. she’s filled with secrets, like poor laura.
overall, it is an incredibly rich book about guilt and betrayal, with complicated and generally unlikable characters. it’s hard to root for anyone in this book. but in a good way. with first-person narratives, you want to see all the gritty nasty bits of a character. when you can see into their souls, as it were, and you see only pretty shit, they come across as underdeveloped and unrealistic. it is all out in the open here. jealousy and malice and rage and judgment, but all tempered by good qualities like loyalty and love and good intentions. it’s the whole package—characters you understand because they are neither squeaky clean teen detectives nor sordid antiheroes. i thought they were really well-drawn.
now for the bad stuff. the ending…is not satisfying. the whodunit is fine, but there is a showdown that was totally silly. oh, dear. too convenient by half.
the epilogue was a big bowl of “who cares…”
and the part where we find out why carly dumped neily before her life started getting out of control was difficult to swallow. the author covered her bases; the decision was totally in keeping with the character of carly, as shown in one flashback in particular, but it still smacked of contrivance. i can’t accept that a teenage girl has that kind of perspective in a situation like that. i was one, and i had no clue what my motives were half the time.
overall it is a solid read. i enjoyed the setting and the problems of this world. it definitely held my interest, and i would classify it as a page turner, but one whose pages i would only turn once.
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