Review: Just too dark and too fast
Rating: 2 out of 5
Date: 04 14, 2013
PTSD in a main character is often hard to read and harder still to understand. Two characters with PTSD is a real challenge. It is a deep subject that requires lots of details and time to get through. The characters are often unpleasant and angst filled. But done right these stories are one I read again and again.Shell Shockedcomes to mind. Difficult characters, but heart warming and beautiful at the same time. I won't be reading this book again. In fact, I had to go back to the description to get their names and anything about them. Without the PTSD, these guys had almost zero development.This book was very confusing at times. Both Neil and Jeremy have PTSD, but for different reasons. They are to put it mildly both complete messes. Neil has lost his life partner to a tragic murder, but he can't talk about it because his family tolerate him, but don't want to hear about his lifestyle. So he suffers in silence. Jeremy has PTSD from the war and his family kick him out because an ex outed him. He has no job, no home, no clothes, nothing at all. So he is depressed and all alone at Christmas time.So Jeremy uses his last dollar to travel from Florida to Chicago where his childhood friend/ex lover lives. This part is still a mystery. There are references to the two having a one night stand and then nothing afterwards. In fact they hadn't spoken in 5 years. It was hard to understand whether they considered each other friends from childhood or lost loves. They never talked about it. And to the reader, it was an irritating part of the book. They both had strong feeling about their past, but we never got that far.The biggest issue was time. The entire book took place in about a week. Within a few days of Jeremy arriving they are off to visit Neil's emotionally closed off family for Christmas, where the rest of the book comes to a joyful and merciful conclusion. So we have two men with debilitating PTSD, a holiday road trip, unresolved anger at each other and at all family members, and an ending that takes 4 pages. The only fun part of this book is a road trip to the "Bridges of Madison County". That part was kinda fun, but more for the bridges than the guys.We do get an epilogue that skips forward a year to tie up the guys lives and make them now seem whole. But the subject matter demanded more than a few days at the holidays to do it justice. It didn't feel real and that just isn't what I expect from L A Witt.