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Raffaella Barker

Författare till Hens Dancing

9+ verk 566 medlemmar 15 recensioner 1 favoritmärkta

Om författaren

Inkluderar namnen: Rafaella Barker, Raffaella Barker

Serier

Verk av Raffaella Barker

Hens Dancing (1999) 185 exemplar
Summertime (2001) 125 exemplar
Green Grass (2002) 53 exemplar
A Perfect Life (2006) 49 exemplar
Come and Tell Me Some Lies (1994) 42 exemplar
From a Distance (2014) 38 exemplar
Poppyland (2008) 32 exemplar
Phosphorescence (2004) 26 exemplar
The Hook (1996) 16 exemplar

Associerade verk

The English Landscape: Its Character and Diversity (1700) — Bidragsgivare — 76 exemplar
The Virago Book of Wanderlust and Dreams (1998) — Bidragsgivare — 36 exemplar
Loss: An Anthology (1997) — Bidragsgivare — 18 exemplar

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Recensioner

This book reminded me of lazy summer evenings, sitting in the garden with friends and family, chatting about nothing of consequence into the smal hours and watching the sun rise again the next morning. It had the same sleepy quality to it, where things moved at their own pace and nothing was rushed.

I entered the Goodreads givewaway to win this book as I was interested in the way in which the strands of the story would mesh together. The two main locations in the book - Cornwall and Norfolk - are both places I am very familiar with and I thought the atmosphere and character of the two places was wonderfully portrayed. Again, it's the relaxed pace of life that is very endearing.

Unfortunately, the whole storyline has this kind of pace and pleasantness to it that didn't really give it much of an edge. There was no conflict, no crisis (other than that related to sheep or ice-cream), no unlikeable characters (everyone was pleasant and relaxed). One surprise at the end which, for me, failed to shock or alter the pace of the story.

The way the elements of the story merged together often felt forced. There were also a few unanswered questions - at the beginning of the story Michael made it clear he had to leave Cornwall, but never explained why (unless I missed this?), and his partner accepted this. It was as though the author was shying away from any negativity by making everything that happened absolutely fine. Another example of this was Kit and Luisa's first meeting, where, within minutes of meeting, Kit was feeling her clothing? In what way is this not creepy behaviour? I would've been out of there. But here, it was all fine.

The way in which the story was written was also slow-paced, and relied a lot on characters' reminiscences. There were so many passages devoted to characters recalling events from years past. It slowed the story to the point of nothing happening. If people are standing around thinking about times past, they aren't doing anything. There is no action. Even (potentially) the most active scene in the story, the party at the lighthouse, was told in recollections. This was disappointing, as I thought by this stage that we were getting somewhere. Some of the descriptions were very nicely written, but the main points I can recall now were to do with ice cream, a van and some sheep. The main point of the story got swamped by little details.

The dialogue was at times jumpy and difficult to read, with characters taking tangents that were at times irrelevant. There were also a few continuity issues that made the writing seem a bit sloppy in places.

A note on the book itself - I was quite concerned that, if this is the finished copy of the book, there were a distracting number of errors. These were mainly missing words but there were also some sentences that appeared to have at least two words in the wrong order. This definitely needed a final check-through before it was issued.

To conclude, I didn't completely dislike this book, it just wasn't the book for me. I like a bit more action involving at least one troubled character. This was all a bit too nice.

… (mer)
 
Flaggad
Triduana | 1 annan recension | Jan 25, 2022 |
Interesting story about a woman raising three children alone. She faces various struggles day by day and it is written almost in a diary way. I can totally relate to this woman. It is clear she struggles but also fiercely loves her children. Should she get involved with this David? The reader ends up hoping she will but you don't really end up knowing quite what will happen.
 
Flaggad
LilQuebe | 4 andra recensioner | Mar 2, 2021 |
Tried this because the author lives locally and teaches on the UEA Creative Writing course, but didn't bother to finish it - its just not for me.
 
Flaggad
sarahemmm | 1 annan recension | Aug 11, 2020 |
Cute, quick read - chick lit.
 
Flaggad
cubsfan3410 | 2 andra recensioner | Sep 1, 2018 |

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Statistik

Verk
9
Även av
3
Medlemmar
566
Popularitet
#44,192
Betyg
½ 3.5
Recensioner
15
ISBN
66
Språk
3
Favoritmärkt
1

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