Leah
Written on Jan 17, 2010
When I picked up Sophie Hannah’s second book, Hurting Distance, it was actually by accident as at the time I generally wasn’t a fan of psychological thrillers however I found Hurting Distance very absorbing and I struggled to put it down. I then managed to pick up her debut and although I didn’t enjoy it as much as Hurting Distance I still found it very absorbing and set about getting all of Sophie’s books. The Other Half Lives is her most recent and I looked forward to getting myself stuck into such a huge book.
Like her other books The Other Half Lives alternates between third and first person narratives. The first person narrative is usually told from our lead female character whereas the third person narrative is to do with the investigation itself. It’s a very clever writing style as I don’t think choosing just one of the writing styles would work for this type of book. As it is we get the chance to really get to know the victim, who in this instance would be Ruth, as well as getting to see as an overview, how the police work the case in progress.
As far as plot goes The Other Half Lives is ridiculously complex. The book has hundreds of different strands running at any given time meaning that to keep all of the threads correct in your head you need to give this book 100% of your attention because it’s incredibly easy to get lost off if you lose concetration even for a second. No matter how complex the plot is, it’s also incredibly clever. I constantly tried to guess just why Aidan had confessed to Ruth that he had killed a woman who was so blatantly alive. Hannah worked this part of the plot very well and doesn’t reveal a thing about why Aidan confessed until well into the book. Of course a plot of such magnitude needs a lot of coincidences to happen for it all to fall into place. The way in which everything slots into place is incredibly coincidental but I was still riveted. Sure, the plot may seem convoluted and incredibly confusing but you can’t fault how riveting the entire thing was.
I have to admit that the weakest point of the book were the characters. For the most part Ruth came across as a complete basket-case and I constantly thought she needed taken away by the men in white jackets. Of course, for most of the book, Ruth is carrying an incredibly sad secret which made me feel more sympathy towards her. I just couldn’t fathom how a woman who went through such a distressing time at the hands of someone else was happy to stay with a man who freely confessed to killing a woman. Regardless of whether the woman in question is alive, it still begs a lot of questions. I can’t say I liked Aidan – he never really came across as a nice person and I just couldn’t see why Ruth was so attracted to him. It rather astounds me that the only character I actually liked was Mary Trelease. That may well surprise those have read the book but… I can’t explain it, she was the only character who seemed relatively sane (oh the irony). Charlie Zailer and Simon Waterhouse, from Hannah’s other books, are the main police officers throughout the book and it seems that, from Hurting Distance (there’s a third book I haven’t read) they seem to be engaged. I felt there was a huge lack of explanation on Hannah’s part there – a brief paragraph about the previous books would have been sufficient somewhere near the beginning of the book because otherwise this book doesn’t work as a stand-alone book. It also seems that Charlie and Simon seem to have had personality transplants. There were glimmers of the pair from Hurting Distance but bar that, they seem to have changed. It was as if they were two totally different characters. There were plenty of superfluous characters in the book – most of them being co-workers of Charlie and Simon who only seemed to be there to fill the pages.
As I’ve mentioned there appears to be a lot of filler in the book. The trade paperback has a massive 550 pages and, although I wouldn’t be able to pick what could have been edited out, I did feel as if there were parts that could have been shortened/cut out completely. The book definitely could have been streamlined into a more manageable book. Another huge problem I had with the book was the ending. It seemed rather abrupt and convenient. To throw in such a random accusation/truth right at the end to try and justify something so horrid was irritating and was a huge let down for me. There was absolutely no mention of the harm suffered throughout the entire book up until the second to last chapter so it all seemed forced. I would also have liked a bit more explanation – after the big dramatic scene near the end, things wrapped up incredibly quickly and I was left feeling let down. Apart from those final twenty pages I really rate Sophie Hannah’s writing. She can weave a massive web and manages to somehow pass it all off by the time I reach the end of the book.
If you’re a fan of psychological suspense books but haven’t yet read one of Sophie’s books I’d probably recommend you start with her first book and work your way through the series (Little Face, Hurting Distance, The Point of Rescue & The Other Half Lives) as there’s a huge lack of explanation in her more recent books about what went on in earlier books. Not to mention the fact her first two books were excellent where as I thought this book was only OK. If you’ve read her other books, give it a read. If not, start with her first.