The Death House, Sarah Pinborough

I mostly skimmed this book, because the whole creeping fear of the illness thing… it gets to me. It’s one of the things my anxiety does to me: just a constant sense that my body is a ticking timebomb, and sooner or later, something will go wrong. I don’t need the idea of a test to tell if you’re Defective, a whole society that condones locking people who have that gene away. So, yeah, I mostly skimmed this one.

It’s not a bad story, actually. I wasn’t sure, from the concept, but I did find myself getting absorbed and stopping to read some sections. The writing is pretty good — there are some really gorgeous bits, particularly at the end. That last line, “I’m not afraid” — ahh. Lovely.

The creepiness and suspense, well, what with trying to avoid the details of the illness and so on, I didn’t really get a full sense of that. Neil Gaiman blurbed it, though, so you can see what kind of audience this is aiming at, the tone that it goes for. In this case, bear in mind that the rating I give it is a compromise between how good I think the book is (probably four stars) and my discomfort with the subject matter (two stars), since I rate things according to my personal enjoyment.

Rating: 3/5

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, J.K. Rowling

Back to my Harry Potter reread! Woo. This was always my favourite of the four books I’ve read, and I was actually a little reluctant to finish it and move on to the next. I enjoyed Harry’s relationships with Lupin and the brief glimpse of his relationship with Sirius, and the way that their inclusion expands the world a little and gives us a hint of Harry’s parents’ lives, and also of the dark frightened world before Voldemort was defeated.

The Dementors, to me, are more frightening than Voldemort. At least as far as I’ve read in the books, he can’t take away your capacity for hope, even if he plunges you into despair. The Dementors… the moment when Sirius cringes in front of them, near the end, is horrible. They’re the first real signs of a darker touch to the wizarding world; something that can’t just kill you, but can steal your soul — Voldemort can’t do that.

The teenage drama of Ron and Hermione is… less fun. I gather it pretty much carries on as it is, and that maybe it’s meant to foreshadow their relationship being different to the relationship with Harry, and it’s not really an aspect I’m interested in. Honestly, I’m not particularly fond of the idea of any pairing up in these books — unless it’s Sirius and Lupin. Uh.

Enjoyed the reread, though I’m not sure I enjoyed it to the same extent I used to.

Rating: 4/5

Poison, Sarah Pinborough

This is a difficult book to decide about, for me. I like the narration, the way it’s written; it’s deceptively simply written, with that fairytale like tone, and yet there’s a lot of rewriting going on. It’s not just the sexual content, but also the ambivalent attitude to the same. There’s casual sex, sex for power, shameful sex… You’d think it would be sex positive, with the powerful figures of Snow White and Lilith, but it really isn’t; sex is a thing that people seem to use to control each other, it’s just taking of power.

I’m not a big fan of all that, though I’m thinking that probably wasn’t what the author wanted a reader to take away from the story. But the ambivalence isn’t just about the portrayal of sex: it’s also about Lilith, the wicked stepmother. She’s young, she used to laugh, and Snow wants to get through to her… but she’s transforming into something wicked. There’s a commentary there on power and powerlessness, too. Sometimes it seems like we’re meant to pity Lilith, to believe she’s doing things wrong but wishing she could get them right. Sometimes she just seems hateful. The line isn’t walked delicately enough to keep both sides in sight.

There’s also all the allusions to other stories — Aladdin, Hansel and Gretel — which felt too obtrusive to be clever, to me.

I’m planning to read Charm, and maybe Beauty as well, and that might help me figure out what to think.

Rating: 3/5