Review: A Treat for the Senses and an Unforgettable Story
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 07 2, 2014
A Study in Flesh was suggested to me by a friend and I approached it with my normal trepidation, but the description seemed interesting enough, if a bit complicated. I tend to like straightforward stories with relatively simple plot paths, but I am also eternally attracted to good, stylized, original forms of writing. I think that Evans has a powerful gift for description and sees the world in a way that some people can't. Being able to translate such vivid, rich scenes into the written word is impossible for most people (even some authors) and yet Evans tirelessly described the world of her characters in three-dimensional detail. At times, it was almost a bit exhausting, which isn't always a good thing in a book, unless that exhaustion is coming from the amount of work a reader is willingly pouring into the reading experience.The plot was convoluted and intense, bouncing around different parts of the world, ranging from legal proceedings to political displays to violence, romance, reflection, rebellion, and everything in between. That would be my only critique of the novel; the author almost tries to do too much. Obviously, the lives of these two main characters (primarily Ron, but also Mercedes) are complex, but there were some moments that seemed too drawn out, even though they didn't have a major impact on the plot itself. That being said, Evans masterfully wove those stories together and made it so that the reader felt like they were traveling along an emotional roller-coaster, but not one that they wanted to get off. This was a powerfully conceived and delivered book, with enough splashes of art, social criticism, romance, and self-analysis that almost any reader would find something in it that they loved.