Wednesday 27 May 2015

The Execution of Noa P. Singleton, Elizabeth L. Silver

I really enjoyed this. It is a definite page turner; you don't find out the 'truth' until the very end. It is very well written, and you feel that Silver has a lot of respect for the reader; allowing us to make up our own minds rather than spoon-feeding us a moral outcome.

The story follows Noa P. Singleton, when we meet her she is on death row and her execution date is in six months. Silver reveals the story to us in snippets and from Noa's point of view.


The thing I loved the most about this is the story, when we finally find out the whole of it, is not cut and dry. It is complicated and mixed together with bad decisions, mistakes and bad luck. You get the feeling Silver is making a point; in life there aren't goodies and badies, but situations people react to, one way or another. Silver opens the novel with the line 'In this world you are either good or evil' and then shows us how this is not true, how the world puts is into categories which then makes others' react to or think of us in a certain way and creates a sort of self fulfilling prophecy. The novel is complicated and intelligent, as well as being a gripping read.