Review: OK
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 03 3, 2014
I'd say 3.5 stars but I do like to round ratings up, hence 4 stars.I did like the story line a lot. I liked chapters in Anne's POV, though at times the POV wasn't clear and I found myself wondering who is seeing or thinking this.Constant jumping back and front from Genevieve to Anne's story made it for a bit of a choppy read, but once I settled in the book, it didn't bother me. Until the very end where Constable pretty much re-told Genevieve's story and in detail. Usually when a story is passed down from generation to generation, details get lost in the shuffle.We met Genevieve at the beginning of the book and her story ended at the continuation of where we left her in the first chapter. The long chapters before she ended in the abbey could've been omitted. She could've reflected on her tragic life through out the book and the reader would get it.We never did learn what exactly happened to her father. Only that he went from loving, caring man to a lunatic when he returned from the "hunted forest".If the whole book was told from Anne's POV and she discovered these things about Genevieve along the way, it would build mystery and provoke reader to find out. Instead we pretty much knew what happened and Anne just merely sensed some of it. Her and Neil's emotions weren't built up to really "feel" the creepy part. As if they are standing on the sidewalks watching this unveiling before them but are not part of it.One more thing ... DNA would not date the bones, carbon dating would, though it was doubtful that even bones would stay intact in that hollow for over 6 centuries. DNA is a matching game, the police would have to have DNA sample on file to match it to Genevieve.The abbess's hatred toward Genevieve and other nuns that didn't follow her was portrayed very good.There were many instances of very long dialogue which reads like info dumping and telling. A few minor errors with misplaced quotation marks, missing punctuation, and missing word from a sentence.All these things took some of the enjoyment from my reading experience, though the book is interesting.