Reviews

Small World by Jonathan Evison

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grahambach's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted mysterious reflective relaxing sad tense medium-paced

4.75

candacesiegle_greedyreader's review

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3.0

3.5 stars

"Small World" is one of those books I should have adored but somehow didn't. Jonathan Evison is a good writer, the characters are well-developed, the sense of place is always on point. The story follows four marginalized people of the 1850, and scoots ahead to 2019 where we see their descendants all on a train headed for disaster. It's weird--I put this book down and picked it up again later and happily finished it. I look forward to others' take on it.

I'm grateful to Netgalley and Dutton for digital review copy in exchange for an honest review.

afreeby's review against another edition

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emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

craftygoat's review against another edition

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5.0

Way back in my late teens, I cut my historical fiction "teeth" on James Michener. This book reminded me of how much I enjoyed those sweeping sagas. While I initially balked at the introduction of so many characters (I made notes to keep track), I quickly became absorbed with them & their stories. I wouldn't have minded a little more closure on a couple of the story lines, but oh well. Will definitely be adding others from this author to my to-read list. [Also, I listened to the audiobook for parts of this & thought the narration was fantastic!]

cinfhen's review

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adventurous emotional inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.5

jwrosenberg69's review

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4.0

I am not one to recap the book. I don’t like reiterating the story. I usually write about how it made me feel and what about the book made it great

This was well written, great characters that were drawn out enough to the point, that with many different characters, I felt I got enough information to learn, who was who, and who to feel empathy for, who to feel angry at, etc.

I have noticed in reviews on Goodreads, that many don’t like time jumps. I have never minded time jumps, and I don’t think this book would have been as powerful as it is without them. In fact, there is no way this book could have been written in a linear fashion without disengaging the reader.

Almost every reader knows the outcome of the book before they start, because that isn’t the point. The joy of this book is how all the events, via fhe time jumps and each person‘s backstory, brings them to the point where they are all on the train together at the same time.