Safekeeping

by Karen Hesse

[Joséphine]

Main reason I didn't complete this book was that it was due at the library. At the same time, I doubt I intend to pick it up again to finish it.

The concept of the novel is what intrigued me when I first picked it up. Photographs to accompany the writing. Perfect, no? Why else do we say a picture's worth a thousand words? Sadly, this fell a little short for me. I covered slightly more than half but up to then I thought that the story could've been told without the photos. Radley spends a good deal walking. Most of the way was deserted though she did encounter people. The photographs portrayed a lot of the emptiness on the road and of the landscape and at times they seemed to have been included for the sake of meeting the photo count. Consequently, the photos didn't exactly add to the text as much as I had hoped and in some cases even detracted from the introspection on Radley's part.