as pageturner as it is, i wish it could be compressed. some parts are too long.

I'm not finishing more books than I am finishing these days, I think, but that's a decision I took some time ago - if a novel is moving me not one jot, then I will not persevere. I did try with this Waters, though, because I have loved just about everything else she's written. But when you get to 35% (kindle money) and realise that you've read little more than repetitive exposition so far, you know that you've had enough. I hope for the sake of those of you who do stick with it that *something* happens (aside from the obvious which we saw coming on, like, page 2 and stopped caring about by page 11).

Took me a long time to read this. Not Sarah Waters best book

Okay, so clearly this AUDIOBOOK took me soooo long to finish. It felt about the same length as game of thrones but without all the action. I really enjoyed the first half of the book, even if it was slow-moving, that seemed appropriate to the story. However, once Lenny goes kaputski, I sort of lost interest and the book's entire tone changed dramatically to one I simply wasn't very interested in. My ending: Lenny meets an unfortunate end and Lil and Frances live their lives together happily. There. I fixed it. I feel bad giving it two stars, since the first half got 4 in my mind, but the second half was just not what I signed up for...

This was so much more enjoyable than my last Waters book, The Night Watch. It is a slow burn, and takes quite awhile for the action to happen, but once it does it's really exciting. I knew the basic gist of the first part of the story, but was totally thrown by the developments halfway through. As a result, the book is clearly divided in two different stories: forbidden love and crime/court drama. In the first half, I really enjoyed Frances and Lilian and their story. I found them both likable and charming and really rooted for them. In the second half though, Frances especially became pretty unlikable to me. One small detail that really changed my opinion was (view spoiler)[how she started calling Lilian "Lily" like Len used to, despite her wanting to call her Lilian earlier in the novel because most people didn't call her that. It was especially when she was saying nasty things to Lilian, which really soured me on her and their relationship (hide spoiler)]. I also found them both ridiculously stupid with how they handled the events, and found myself quite frustrated with how the second half unfolded, especially with their conversations about what was happening. The second half was also a bit tedious and bloated, but then it ended too soon. I wanted more resolution afterwards and less build-up during the trial. Overall, not Waters' best, but still better than a couple others. It's squarely in the middle for me. Only one left!

Too good to put down. The ending, however, seemed a bit dull.