Are we not all outsiders to another person’s life?
Mesmerizing Debut Novel
The novel’s unique structure lacks traditional chapters, paragraphs or narrator. Instead there are 1-2 page personal accounts, giving a 360 degree view of the leadup and the aftermath of one family’s tragedy. I had read about one-third of the book before even learning how somebody died but yet still did not know who had died.
There are dozens of unreliable narrators with differing degrees of closeness. Sympathetic words mask superiority, scorn, prejudice and exploitation. The family at the heart of the story are not themselves part of the interviews.
This is the story of us. It’s about communities, families, individuals, activists, media and mistakes. In the 21st century of course the final and inevitable indignity is a true-crime documentary.
