Review by ab2020 -- The Neigbour At Number 18 (Reload)
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ab2020
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Review by ab2020 -- The Neigbour At Number 18 (Reload)
[Following is a volunteer review of "The Neigbour At Number 18 (Reload)" by Hawa Crickmore.]
1 out of 4 stars
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Abuse, illness, and complicated family relationships are difficult subjects to write about. To tackle them all at once is something that only a very adventurous author would try. Hawa Crickmore does attempt to tackle them all in The Neighbour at Number 18. This novel begins as a story of two families and their relationship over the course of two generations. Brenda and Maureen are the mothers of Maria and Emilia, respectively. The two girls become friends, but eventually, Emilia’s cousin, Tyler, begins to blackmail Emilia.
In exchange for Tyler’s favor, Emilia is forced to sexually groom Maria for him. Tyler proceeds to abuse Maria, and even though Tyler is later imprisoned, Maria’s traumatic experience burdens her with anxiety and depression. The story goes on to follow Maria as she becomes a lawyer, develops a loving relationship with a man named Ron, and starts a family. However, the legacy of the abuse she suffered at the age of 13 remains with her into her fifties. The Neighbour at Number 18 explores the this legacy and the difficulties that it brings to Maria’s adult life.
I have a complicated relationship with the term “DNF”—“did not finish”. On one hand, I am extremely aware of the perils of the sunk cost fallacy, and I seldom make excuses about the time that would go to waste if I were to give up halfway through a book. On the other hand, I feel a desire to respect the work of authors and wish to discover the full extent of the stories they tell. The Neighbour at Number 18 really challenged me in terms of respecting the work of the author. I thought many times about giving it up, but in the end, I felt as if it had to be worth something. I was wrong.
The novel’s problems begin in the first few pages. The plot is fairly linear, but the verb tenses change continually, which makes the events extremely difficult to follow. The cast of characters is on the larger side, and even though the names were easy to remember, I had a hard time keeping track of the relationships between the characters. This is partially because some characters who play important roles in the first few chapters subsequently disappear from the narrative. This threw my perspective of the book into disarray. Every few chapters, I had to reorient myself and reconsider which characters had taken center stage in the plot.
The book also seemed very unprofessional, which made matters worse. The writer used relatively simple and amateurish language. The copy I received was full of typographical errors. Nearly every page contained at least one comma splice. Nearly every passage of dialogue contained missing punctuation. Some sentences had multiple punctuation marks at the end. The paragraphs were not indented. Some sentences simply broke off in the middle. Even the spellings of the characters’ names changed throughout the book. All this made it extremely difficult to focus on the plot of the novel.
Sure, The Neighbour at Number 18 tackles some important issues, but there are hundreds of far more worthwhile books out there that tackle those same issues. For all the time you will spend considering the meanings of the characters’ words and actions in this book, you will spend twice as much time dissecting what a sentence actually says. This book is a reasonable attempt at a dramatic family saga, but it is not much more than an attempt. Thus, I rate this book 1 out of 4 stars.
******
The Neigbour At Number 18 (Reload)
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
1 out of 4 stars
Share This Review
Abuse, illness, and complicated family relationships are difficult subjects to write about. To tackle them all at once is something that only a very adventurous author would try. Hawa Crickmore does attempt to tackle them all in The Neighbour at Number 18. This novel begins as a story of two families and their relationship over the course of two generations. Brenda and Maureen are the mothers of Maria and Emilia, respectively. The two girls become friends, but eventually, Emilia’s cousin, Tyler, begins to blackmail Emilia.
In exchange for Tyler’s favor, Emilia is forced to sexually groom Maria for him. Tyler proceeds to abuse Maria, and even though Tyler is later imprisoned, Maria’s traumatic experience burdens her with anxiety and depression. The story goes on to follow Maria as she becomes a lawyer, develops a loving relationship with a man named Ron, and starts a family. However, the legacy of the abuse she suffered at the age of 13 remains with her into her fifties. The Neighbour at Number 18 explores the this legacy and the difficulties that it brings to Maria’s adult life.
I have a complicated relationship with the term “DNF”—“did not finish”. On one hand, I am extremely aware of the perils of the sunk cost fallacy, and I seldom make excuses about the time that would go to waste if I were to give up halfway through a book. On the other hand, I feel a desire to respect the work of authors and wish to discover the full extent of the stories they tell. The Neighbour at Number 18 really challenged me in terms of respecting the work of the author. I thought many times about giving it up, but in the end, I felt as if it had to be worth something. I was wrong.
The novel’s problems begin in the first few pages. The plot is fairly linear, but the verb tenses change continually, which makes the events extremely difficult to follow. The cast of characters is on the larger side, and even though the names were easy to remember, I had a hard time keeping track of the relationships between the characters. This is partially because some characters who play important roles in the first few chapters subsequently disappear from the narrative. This threw my perspective of the book into disarray. Every few chapters, I had to reorient myself and reconsider which characters had taken center stage in the plot.
The book also seemed very unprofessional, which made matters worse. The writer used relatively simple and amateurish language. The copy I received was full of typographical errors. Nearly every page contained at least one comma splice. Nearly every passage of dialogue contained missing punctuation. Some sentences had multiple punctuation marks at the end. The paragraphs were not indented. Some sentences simply broke off in the middle. Even the spellings of the characters’ names changed throughout the book. All this made it extremely difficult to focus on the plot of the novel.
Sure, The Neighbour at Number 18 tackles some important issues, but there are hundreds of far more worthwhile books out there that tackle those same issues. For all the time you will spend considering the meanings of the characters’ words and actions in this book, you will spend twice as much time dissecting what a sentence actually says. This book is a reasonable attempt at a dramatic family saga, but it is not much more than an attempt. Thus, I rate this book 1 out of 4 stars.
******
The Neigbour At Number 18 (Reload)
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Latest Review: The Altitude Journals by David J Mauro
