The New York Times Sunday Book Review often gets criticized for running reviews that aim too high and are merely platforms for the reviewers to position themselves among the literary elite. This often results in reviews that confuse many of their readers. They come off as trying too hard to sound intellectual instead of providing interesting and insightful looks at books today. I can’t tell you how pleased I was to read Chelsea Cain‘s wonderful review of The Heretic’s Daughter in today’s Book Review. It succeeded in not only providing an insightful and enticing review of The Heretics Daughter (resulting in my own desire to actually read the book) but it also worked as a wonderful platform for Ms. Cain’s own writing. Anyone who could write such a wonderfully clear, concise and authentic review of a book that is so dissimilar from her own novel’s subjects and yet break it down into such an approachable and interesting read, is most certainly a writer to watch. Here is how she describes the main character.
Here is where Kent makes a clever choice. The narrator of the book is not Martha but her daughter Sarah (she is 9 and 10 through much of the novel), whose “flaming hair and spotted face” bespeak her “suspicious and prickly nature.” She’s Scout Finch meets Anne Shirley, with a cap and collar.
And as a side note, I met Chelsea Cain at Book Expo America last June and I was immediately enamored by her wonderfully exuberant personality. She reminded me of the cool older sister who makes you feel excited about everything. She was wonderfully upbeat and honestly interested in meeting new people. The most fascinating aspect of Chelsea seems to be the fact that she is a very happy, free-spirited woman who writes psychological thrillers about serial killers. Now if that doesn’t intrigue you, I don’t know what does!? She even writes on her website, “How a Nice Girl Like Me Ending Up Writing Stories Like These.”
chelsea cain
