Legend Press, October 1, 2015.
Three Stars
The synopsis of this book tells us that four students are involved in a tragedy that rips their friendship apart, and they are reunited twenty five years later. I found this a bit misleading, because the “tragic event” really played such a small part in the story. There wasn’t even much anticipation leading up to it, and in fact I forgot that we were waiting for some sort of climax to occur.
Complicating things further was the fact that there were actually two incidents we were supposed to be looking forward to – one in 1988 when the four were students, and another in 2013, in which Cameron lost his marriage and may be losing his job. Because there were not many clues to either incident, they just didn’t seem that exciting and it was sort of a let-down when we discovered what actually happened.
With two incidents set in different time periods, there was a lot of jumping back and forth between the timelines. It was very choppy, and the time changes happened randomly, with no flow. It also didn’t help that there were multiple footnotes at the end of each chapter that explained small details and didn’t really add anything to the story – they were mostly just Cameron trying to be clever.
While the insecure Cameron is uncertain how he fits into the group, he is in fact the one holding it all together. I did like the four oddball main characters, who were all very flawed and yet likeable. Aside from Cameron, there is also Bex, a politically minded beauty who Cameron is quietly in love with. Tommo, Bex’s boyfriend, is the classic bad boy, playing in a band and getting into trouble. Then there’s Christie, on exchange in England from Canada, so of course she gets along with everyone. There were some clever lines and astute character-building. Their actions show the fine line between good and evil, as the four young people grow into mature adults and learn to take responsibility for their actions.
The title of the novel is from one of Tommo’s band’s songs, taken from a John Keats’ poem. It was who they were, until one tragic event dimmed the light of their friendship. The storyline is original and unusual, and doesn’t fall easily into any one genre – part mystery, part romance, part coming-of-age story. The pace accelerated towards the final reveal, but in the end, it was anticlimactic because it didn’t really matter at all. The ending was somewhat happy, but tied everything up a little too neatly. There were some bright moments in this novel, but I was left wishing for more.
I received this book for free from Legend Press and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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