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A review by finding_novel_land
Elizabeth Is Missing by Emma Healey
3.0
This sort of book makes me doubt rating books as an appropriate way to review them.
Because while this book was not that enjoyable, I still appreciate this book as being well written.
Elizabeth is Missing is about a woman called Maud with dementia. One of the most unreliable narrators you could hope to have, this first-person narrative is completely, and purposefully, claustrophobic, and continually switches between Maud's search for her friend Elizabeth in the present day, and her historical search for her sister in 1946.
One example of my conflict between rating on enjoyment and skill is demonstrated in the opening chapters. I found them to be very repetitive and frustrating, the author relying on a constant pattern of Maud doing something and then forgetting about it 2 paragraphs later. As a reader, I could practically predict the next three pages after reading something. Was I not intrigued by an incredibly well written blurb I would have probably DNF'd it. However, I would be completely ignorant if I didn't understand that while this cyclical writing was annoying, it was completely representative of the dementia Maud suffered from.
And so lies the conundrum.
I normally use enjoyment as my scale for rating books; how much I emoted with the characters, how much I was drawn into the plot. But when it is the topic being written about that is influencing the writing style, can enjoyment alone be used to rate the work? The author achieved the purpose of the book pretty well, but that did not translate into something that was 100% right to me. Sure it will stay with me, but it didn't move me.
Something to ponder there fellow readers...
While I found the third quarter to be the most gripping, I found the final section quite underwhelming and rushed.
I found the reveal that Elizabeth was in hospital quite underwhelming, in that it was so mundane/normal after having 200 pages to work out what was going on. After that revelation, I found the whole plot skipped about 5 steps and suddenly they were digging in Elizabeth's garden and uncovering Maud's sister. As with a lot of books I've read lately I've found the build up to reveal ratio to be quite off. That being said, the BIG reveal of Maud mixing up Sukey's disappearance with Elizabeth is pretty clever and as I sit here writing this I'm still in awe of the plot set up in that regard.
Also, I find it quite odd, looking back, that Helen didn't remind her mother, for example with notes, that Elizabeth was not missing. She claims that she was telling Maud all the time that she was in hospital, however for the first 2/3rds seemed to be as clueless as Maud was. Of course, this could be Maud not hearing her, but it does seem awfully convenient for the writer.
On a positive note, the epilogue was entirely heartbreaking and a fitting end.
Overall, Elizabeth is Missing is a fascinating spin on a tale of a woman with dementia, however the underlying 'mystery' plot was quite underwhelming and rushed.
Because while this book was not that enjoyable, I still appreciate this book as being well written.
Elizabeth is Missing is about a woman called Maud with dementia. One of the most unreliable narrators you could hope to have, this first-person narrative is completely, and purposefully, claustrophobic, and continually switches between Maud's search for her friend Elizabeth in the present day, and her historical search for her sister in 1946.
One example of my conflict between rating on enjoyment and skill is demonstrated in the opening chapters. I found them to be very repetitive and frustrating, the author relying on a constant pattern of Maud doing something and then forgetting about it 2 paragraphs later. As a reader, I could practically predict the next three pages after reading something. Was I not intrigued by an incredibly well written blurb I would have probably DNF'd it. However, I would be completely ignorant if I didn't understand that while this cyclical writing was annoying, it was completely representative of the dementia Maud suffered from.
And so lies the conundrum.
I normally use enjoyment as my scale for rating books; how much I emoted with the characters, how much I was drawn into the plot. But when it is the topic being written about that is influencing the writing style, can enjoyment alone be used to rate the work? The author achieved the purpose of the book pretty well, but that did not translate into something that was 100% right to me. Sure it will stay with me, but it didn't move me.
Something to ponder there fellow readers...
While I found the third quarter to be the most gripping, I found the final section quite underwhelming and rushed.
I found the reveal that Elizabeth was in hospital quite underwhelming, in that it was so mundane/normal after having 200 pages to work out what was going on. After that revelation, I found the whole plot skipped about 5 steps and suddenly they were digging in Elizabeth's garden and uncovering Maud's sister. As with a lot of books I've read lately I've found the build up to reveal ratio to be quite off. That being said, the BIG reveal of Maud mixing up Sukey's disappearance with Elizabeth is pretty clever and as I sit here writing this I'm still in awe of the plot set up in that regard.
Also, I find it quite odd, looking back, that Helen didn't remind her mother, for example with notes, that Elizabeth was not missing. She claims that she was telling Maud all the time that she was in hospital, however for the first 2/3rds seemed to be as clueless as Maud was. Of course, this could be Maud not hearing her, but it does seem awfully convenient for the writer.
On a positive note, the epilogue was entirely heartbreaking and a fitting end.
Overall, Elizabeth is Missing is a fascinating spin on a tale of a woman with dementia, however the underlying 'mystery' plot was quite underwhelming and rushed.