Rinn's Review of See How Small

by Scott Blackwood

A riveting novel about the aftermath of a brutal murder of three teenage girls, written in incantatory prose ‘that's as fine as any being written by an American author today’ (Ben Fountain)

One late autumn evening in a Texas town, two strangers walk into an ice cream shop shortly before closing time. They bind up the three teenage girls who are working the counter, set fire to the shop, and disappear. ‘See How Small’ tells the stories of the survivors – family, witnesses, and suspects – who must endure in the wake of atrocity. Justice remains elusive in their world, human connection tenuous.

Hovering above the aftermath of their deaths are the three girls. They watch over the town and make occasional visitations, trying to connect with and prod to life those they left behind. "See how small a thing it is that keeps us apart," they say. A master of compression and lyrical precision, Scott Blackwood has surpassed himself with this haunting, beautiful, and enormously powerful new novel.

I received a copy of this book for free from Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review. Also posted on my blog, Rinn Reads.

See How Small was one of my top anticipated releases for this year, and oh how disappointed I was.

Whilst Scott Blackwood surely has a talent for beautiful prose, and there were some sentences that were just absolutely gorgeous, the story felt so disjointed. It seemed to skip around from character to character and event to event, with no real link to what happened next. Because of the constant flitting between characters, I never got a chance to get to know any of them, and as a result felt very removed from the story. What did it matter to me if X was having an affair with Y? As well as this, I often completely lost track of who I was following because one minute it was one character, the next a totally different one.

Ultimately, whilst the story started off well, it just did not work for me. The book felt so uneventful and I was actually bored in parts – I’m just glad it was a quick read, because I was very much tempted to give up on it. I was also disappointed at how little the girls were involved considering the blurb – they may have been the ones narrating, but you wouldn’t have known if not for a short section at the beginning.

However, whilst this book did not work for me, it appears to have been a hit with many other people, with many four and five star ratings on Goodreads. I just wish I could agree with them!

See How Small

by Scott Blackwood

Reviewed by Rinn on Feb 1, 2015

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