The Essex Serpent

Apologies to the author but this one isn't for me. Incredibly dull, huge number of pages with epic descriptions with nothing happening. Unlikeable characters also don't help, a book needs somebody for you to cheer on. The setting of this book should have been stunning in it's bleakness but I felt nothing for it, even a sheep stuck in the mud provoked no emotions. It probably doesn't help that I kept wanting to compare to Wuthering Heights, so it was already off to a losing start as not many books can stand up to the quality of Wuthering Heights.

There is a TV series for this, I might watch it to see if that helps me to understand the appeal for this book.

I definitely enjoyed reading The Essex Serpent, but I'm not entirely sure what I think of it.

Some of the characters were very strongly written, but some of the others I kept mixing up, as if the personalities weren't quite distinct enough to be separate in my mind. I'm not sure whether that's a flaw in the book, or in my concentration.

I liked the way Perry wove the various threads of the various subplots together, and the way she showed the various relationships - marriages, romantic relationships, friendships, parent and child relationships - all interacting. I thought the holding-in-tension of the scientific and religious threads was well done, and I liked the way the spectre of the serpent was used. I'm not sure what I think of the ending: I both want and don't-want to see how things work out in the longer term, although I do think the author stopped at a good stopping place (if that makes sense.)

I think my verdict is: not by any means perfect, but worth reading and pondering. But I am still pondering.