Review: a good man in a tough spot
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 06 24, 2011
I tend to read samples first, and don't always continue to buy the book to read the rest. With DROP BY DROP, I finished the sample and clicked 'buy' immediately--a virtual page-turner!The writing, the story, the tension, the sense of place were all very good but two things in particular made this book a great read for me. First, Raffel walked a very fine line with Sam, motivating him to go against his principles and to deal with his attraction to Cecilia-and both Sam and the author succeeded. I could sympathize with Sam, although I sometimes wanted to shout at him, but the whole way I was rooting for him. That was some very nice, and subtle, characterization.The second element I appreciated was the insider's look at DC. From Keith Raffel's blog I see that he'd lived it, but living something and writing about it both believably and dramatically doesn't always follow. In this case, it did. Fascinating, and somewhat unnerving, to follow the twisting of events by those in power. Drop by drop, indeed.