Another Way To Fall | Amanda Brooke | Review

Another Way To Fall | Amanda Brooke | Review

• Friday, 22 November 2013

First of all, I'm going to start this review by saying that I'm not entirely sure why I wanted to read this book. I had it on request from the library, but I can't remember requesting it. I only request books that a review or a recommendation has made me want to read, so I must have wanted to read it at some point. It's fair to say I went into this with a lot of anticipation.

Another Way to Fall is the story of Emma - told after three years of treatment for brain cancer that there is little more that they can do for her, and that her treatment will now be pallative, rather than curative. Emma starts to write about the life she is now denied. As she writes, the lines between fiction and reality start to blur and her story takes on a life of its own.

The story opens with the horrible news that Emma, the protagonist, will die. Before you get to know Emma or any of the supporting characters, you already know what the end of the book will be. I really struggled with this being so early on in the book, as it became very clear that the book was going to be about Emma's death, rather than her life - and on a personal note, I wasn't sure that was a book that I wanted to read.

Each chapter starts with a page or more of Italic writing about Emma, which comes to light is her writing her book about herself. Unfortunately, for me I felt this came across way too late and made the narrative confusing. Past the first few chapters I also found these excerpts fairly boring, and easily skippable as Emma tended to explain to another character what had just happened in them. They were also just too idyllic, which I understand to be the life Emma wanted, but it was just another factor that made them skippable - it is the formula everyone expects their life to go in, so of course you know the next step. Unfortunately, Emma writing her story is the premise of the book... and as I didn't like that, I didn't like the essence of the book.

So it's a shame, because I obviously wanted to read this book enough to reserve a copy of it but it has to be 3/5 stars for me.

This post was written by regular reviewer Kath, get to know her here