Little Cruelties - Liz Nugent

Thriller/Fiction

Rating: 4/10

When this author debuted her first novel a couple of years ago, I was delighted to find a new writer that could offer up darkly comic domestic thrillers. With her second offering, my praise was restrained by a cast of characters that were diminished in both their level of impressiveness and provocativeness. And with this latest book, I’m out.

William, Brian and Luke are bound by blood but split by fate and a dysfunctional mother. As they grow into adulthood, they play games with each other, little cruelties they call them, that grow more sinister with each passing year.  The book opens with two of the brothers at a funeral, and the other is in the coffin. And so we begin…

Let me be perfectly clear, I have absolutely no issue with unlikable characters.  In fact, I applaud authors who can pull off luring the reader into a story teeming with truly despicable people. But there must be a justification for it, it must serve the narrative.  I don’t want to just read page after page of terrible people doing terrible things with flaccid intent.  And that my friends and followers, is what I got here. 

Thanks to Simon & Schuster Canada, Netgalley and the author for the advanced readers copy.

Footnote: I can’t help but wonder if this would have unwound better without the incessant jumping back and forth in time within each of the three narrators’ stories.