I am drawn to WW2 historical fiction, and the concept of The Things We Cannot Say by Kelly Rimmer is great. It has both modern and historical POVs, which can be powerful if done correctly, and it has a mystery element. It sounds like it should be right up my alley, but it fell flat. It wasnāt entirely ābleh,ā but it wasnāt powerful or awe-inspiring as I hoped.Ā
For one, I knew the ending in advance. The mystery was concluded in a predictable way, and it was not surprising at all. This happens a lot for me, and it doesnāt usually bother me, but I would have appreciated more tension.Ā
The pacing was also really slow, particularly in the beginning. It felt like nothing really happened for the longest time, or at least what I thought should have already happened at one point in the novel always happened later. What do you knowā¦ the pacing also affected the tension. Iām starting to see a patternā¦Ā
Speaking of the bookās effect on the reader, the emotions often felt spoon-fed and contrived. A couple of times, I did feel like I could shed a few tears, so it wasnāt totally lacking in this department. But I just wanted more.Ā
And while Iām mainly neutral about the negatives of the book (along with the positives), the most egregious error was the children. Writing children is hard, particularly when the children are supporting characters. Their characters almost never ring true, and in this book, they both HAD to be special. Eddie was on the spectrum, and Callie was a ten-year-old genius.
I actually thought Eddieās character was interesting, but Rimmer spent so much time on Eddie that she totally neglected Callie. Callie was incredibly underdeveloped and it was hard to see behind her brattiness. She was always an afterthought to Eddie for the author and for her mother, our protagonist. The book would not be that much different without Callie in it, and the character deserves more.Ā
And I wanted more from the book. More power, more tension, more emotions, more complexity. Most of all, I just wanted the book to end. There was nothing in the novel that enthralled me, but it wasnāt bad enough to DNF, so it was just a long, slow drudge to the end.Ā
