Like everyone else, I’m putting up my review to Doomsday Book. This also makes me the fifth person to post it the day before our book club discussion! Procrastinators unite! Anyway, I started writing my review as I was reading, so this is more a reaction than a review, I suppose. And we all know the plot by now. Ahem…
50 pages in – Nothing too bad has happened yet. I’m concerned for the tech who collapsed. I think our heroine is a kind of dumb for letting herself be sent into the past with so little technical preparation. Safety is key, people!
100 pages in – I’m very concerned for Badri. Gilchrist is an ass. Dunworthy is trying his best. Nice to see the Americans are obnoxious and entitled, as we usually are portrayed when the book takes place somewhere other than the good ol’ USA.
100 – 125 – Kivrin is hallucinating. Poor Mr. Dunworthy. Poor Badri. And maybe not poor William, who appears to be very popular with the young female hospital staff. And Colin has arrived! Seeing as he is appearing where the badness is happening, I’m thinking he’s a dumbass.
(Note for the Christina Rosetti quote – raise your hands if you sang the song while you read the quote *raises hand* Hello, fellow chorus members! I tried to insert a video here, but it sadly did not work.)
125 – 200 – When Kivrin first woke up, her thoughts were basically “lulz, i wuz dumb”. You were just deathly ill, girl, and you’re thinking about windows? And we call the language they’re speaking “Middle English” but they wouldn’t, dumbass! Everything you do makes me think you’re a dumbass. Getting up and wandering about when you’re obviously still ill? And what’s up with the fancy rat? Also, Colin is indeed a dumbass for going toward the quarantine area. And William is indeed a ladies man.
200 – 386 – Did the virus come through the tomb somehow? Does Badri have a rat or something? And there’s something fishy about Father Roche. I have a suspicion that he is also from the future, and is “praying” into a recorder, perhaps in English? Poor Blackie! And Kivrin’s thought at the end of chapter 23? “Oh, for fuck’s sake!”
389 – 578 – I read through the rest of this all in one go, which I suppose may have lessened the trauma. I didn’t have time to dwell on what was happening. Basically, everything went to shit. Everything. And Colin may be a dumbass, but I’m kinda glad he was around.
So, for the first two sections I was yelling at characters for being dumbasses, or sympathizing with poor Mr. Dunworthy for trying to get things done. And Finch! I love Finch. All of the kudos for Finch, because he’s holding shit together. And the last third of the book had all of the feels. So while Kivrin was able to pull herself together in the last third of the book, I really wasn’t too fond of her in the beginning. So I suppose I could give it a 3.5 out of 5, but I rounded down to 3.
BTW, where in the world is Mr. Basingame?
I wish I had written you review. It was lovely.