Review: Blue Bear: or the Impossibility of Anonymity




Blue Bear: or the Impossibility of Anonymity by Joseph Grady
My rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

I wasn't sure what to expect with this book. I would say that the cover does not accurately convey the genre. The novel is a mystery novel narrated for the most part by a blue bear who acts as Lucy's, the main character's, spirit guide.

The story was intriguing and enjoyable to read. I was interested in how it would turn out. The characterization was strong. I especially enjoyed the blue bear himself when he was very clearly narrating. He had a strong voice and his perspective on things was fun. Lucy was also a fascinating character.

The dialogue in the story was usually strong and believable. Some of the dialogue was in Italian and my only complaint there was that it was not all translated. (Most of it was in footnotes.) There was also a funny part in Italian where one character mishears 'Czech' as 'blind,' but that wasn't explained in English. I would have liked a note on that, though it was a minor issue.

Grady's descriptions of the various locations in Rome were vivid and made me almost feel as though I were getting to visit.

If it weren't for two issues in the writing, I would probably have given this book a solid 4 or 5 stars.

The biggest issue for me was point of view. For the most part the book seemed to be meant to be from the bear's point of view which I liked, but oftentimes the bear wasn't there (although sometimes it was still clear that he was narrating even then) and events were told from the points of view of various characters. It did not make sense that the bear would know the thoughts and feelings of all of the characters from whose points of view some of the events were narrated and so some of the novel seemed like it was a first person perspective and other parts like third person limited.

Besides the issues with POV, this novel is in need of a thorough edit for typos and consistency issues. For example, at some point 'waist' was written 'waste,' 'pedal' 'petal,' etc, and Grady was not always consistent about capitalization (Kindle/kindle).

Overall, however, I really enjoyed this book and I hope Father Grady will keep writing. He is clearly a talented writer and I think his novel is a sort of diamond in the rough.

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