Evelyn Freeling’s Reviews > The Other Valley > Status Update

I feel like there were missed opportunities as well, especially with Quinton, with Alain, but the moments with these characters were so-short lived, they didn't do much for me thematically, they just sort of served to continue the plot along. Everything feels very one-note and without nuance, which make this hard to enjoy, especially because there's a blurb on the front saying it has echoes of Ishiguro and Murakami.

I really like this concept, I think the prose is strong, but I think some of the technique is lacking. There's almost no interiority, so Odile feels very bland and without personality. I suppose she is a fairly bland and without personality character, so maybe that was the reason for this.

It reminds me of the giver in certain ways. I can kind of see the relevance to Ishiguro and Mandel, but comparing this to Murakami's work... I dont get what Jo Harkin was talking about with that so far.

So far it's really compelling. I think I would have done some extra line editing, some of the chapters take a while to get going and dwindle at the end, but my personal preference is for punchy pacing. I think it also straddles a weird line, the protagonist is in high school but its language is literary, def not YA.