The Best Kind of People
Jun. 20th, 2024 10:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearThe Best Kind of People by Zoe Whittall is the story of a well-regarded high school teacher who is accused of sexual misconduct with several female teenage students on a school trip.
Only it's not really about him at all - it's about his wife, son, daughter, colleagues and neighbours. We never get the accused's point of view; instead, the story follows how the situation affects all the people connected to him, which makes for a very interesting focus.
I love the fact that George's guilt or innocence is left ambiguous, and how the case sparks debate in the small town, with different factions on both sides.
The book is so well written - the prose is fantastic, there's some brilliant imagery and lots of very astute observations about people and society.
I didn't like any of the characters - except maybe Jared - but they all feel intensely real - except maybe Jared...
And there's a fantastically meta aspect to it, with one of the neighbours deciding to write a novel about the situation. I love that the author character is the most despicable of the lot. And I love his agent's criticisms of his first draft - saying it needs to be more sensational, with the teacher's guilt more clear-cut, the scenes of abuse included as direct action, and everything much more heightened (which suggests Kevin's first draft is much more like the actual book...).
The dialogue was a bit stilted in places, with not enough contractions to feel natural. And there were a couple of sections of summary, which diluted the impact of the story.
I'm also not quite sure how I feel about the ending. It felt maybe a bit too realistic? Though that's one of the things I liked most about the book overall, so maybe I shouldn't criticise.
Anyway - it was largely an excellent read and I'll definitely be looking for more by this author.
Only it's not really about him at all - it's about his wife, son, daughter, colleagues and neighbours. We never get the accused's point of view; instead, the story follows how the situation affects all the people connected to him, which makes for a very interesting focus.
I love the fact that George's guilt or innocence is left ambiguous, and how the case sparks debate in the small town, with different factions on both sides.
The book is so well written - the prose is fantastic, there's some brilliant imagery and lots of very astute observations about people and society.
I didn't like any of the characters - except maybe Jared - but they all feel intensely real - except maybe Jared...
And there's a fantastically meta aspect to it, with one of the neighbours deciding to write a novel about the situation. I love that the author character is the most despicable of the lot. And I love his agent's criticisms of his first draft - saying it needs to be more sensational, with the teacher's guilt more clear-cut, the scenes of abuse included as direct action, and everything much more heightened (which suggests Kevin's first draft is much more like the actual book...).
The dialogue was a bit stilted in places, with not enough contractions to feel natural. And there were a couple of sections of summary, which diluted the impact of the story.
I'm also not quite sure how I feel about the ending. It felt maybe a bit too realistic? Though that's one of the things I liked most about the book overall, so maybe I shouldn't criticise.
Anyway - it was largely an excellent read and I'll definitely be looking for more by this author.
