Review: The Night Watch

The Night Watch by Sarah Waters
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

First of all I would like to begin by saying I enjoyed Sarah Walters writing style and the format in which she wrote this plot backwards from the end to the beginning, the descriptive prose made you feel part of the atmosphere of the story. The only thing I struggled with was the pacing of the story, for me I much preferred the pace of the third and final part of the book, at times throughout the rest of the book I felt I had to compel myself to return back to it.

The main characters left me feeling somewhat flat and lacked a personality within their roles of the story which meant at times it was hard to empathise with the circumstances they were finding themselves in.

There were a number of areas however, that did interest me and which I wish had been looked into with more depth.

I enjoyed the bits involving Kay's involvement in the Ambulance Service during the bombings of London, I actually liked the writing of her relationship with Mickey and wish I had gotten the opportunity to know more about her.

The book references the imprisonment of consciencous objectors and I would have like to have heard a few stories from various people as to what made them object.

Duncan's friendship with Alex is dealt with last in the final third of the book with a devastating conclusion however, I would have liked to have known more about his relationship with the Prison Warden and the implied nature of their relationship when he left prison and moved in with him.

I did get frustrated when Viv's character was reduced to purely that of a mistress and although that was the case and would have been viewed as such at that time, she was also clearly very strong and independent to be working for the war office and maintaining her relationship with her brother Duncan.

Finally the concluding scene grated with me and felt too easy as I believe the previous writing was in place that two of the characters could have just walked away making for a more jaw dropping conclusion.

With all this in mind it was a good read and so I have given it 3 stars and will try a further story from Sarah Waters to see how I get on.

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