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The Shadowy Horses

8/18/2013

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To use a quote from this book about a movie Kearsley's character watches, this story has "...a murky plot and a pace that dragged intolerably." 

I loved Kearsley's The Winter Sea. I was hoping for the same experience here, but it never came. Susanna Kearsley is a talented writer and her prose was wondrous but many times it caused the story to drag and sometimes I had to reread a passage to be certain of what the author was trying to tell me.

I never got lost in the story. In fact, even though I liked the characters and I did care about them, I didn't CARE. I mean, I wanted their archaeology dig to be as they wanted it to be, but in the long run, did it matter? It seemed little was at stake. Never did I get so involved that I read and read and lost myself in the plot or characters. I kept wanting the story to get where it was going, but I didn't know where it was going and I don't mean that in a good way where you're asking yourself, "What's going to happen next! I must find out." I mean it in this vein, "What is the point of all this?"

Well, it turns out The Shadowy Horses has a point and a clever climax. It's just that the whole plot is so subtle I had no idea danger was lurking. That may be a good thing for some or even many, but I would have liked a bigger hint that these people (or some of them) were in big trouble. 

I gave this book 3 stars out of 5 on Goodreads and Amazon.

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    Here goes . . .

    I write novels. I've written screenplays, short stories, newsletters, business communications and articles. I'm not great at thank you notes. My sister is, but she doesn't know it. I'm not much for blogging. Don't have something to say worth reading everyday. But this is a blog and we'll see what turns up.   

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