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geohiker's review
2.0
That was not good, every character is a terrible person. It's fun to read about St Cloud, but not a great picture of it.
writesdave's review
3.0
In the spirit of full disclosure, I killed three-and-a-half years in St. Cloud, attending Apollo High School. This book came out right before I moved there, and a buzz surrounded it — probably because no one had bothered to set a novel in St. Cloud, pop. roughly 60,000, 70 miles northwest of the (Twin) Cities, with prairies to the west, pines and spruce to the northeast, broadleaf trees to the southeast, flat, little contour to the land or the people, dark and cold winters. In other words, exactly the kind of insular place where the roaches scatter under the light of day, if you catch my drift.
So I read "Killing Time" sort of as a stroll down memory lane, and I saw much that was familiar in terms of places, things and people. The characters seemed a bit gregarious in contrast to what I remember about Central Minnesotans, but the authors accurately captured the cliques and groups you'd expect in an insular and small town. Also, I heard every word in that German-Canadian-Scandinavian-influenced accent.
Bear in mind this is also a murder mystery, so I kept my spidey sense alert to the clues dropped along the way; the murder doesn't happen until two-thirds of the way through the book, thus the authors spend that time giving all the principles a motive to commit a murder — as well as a reason why each might need killing. In that way, the authors did well in developing the characters and tying them to each other while dropping hints at their sinister pasts. After all, everybody went to high school together and no one can seem to let go of a slight.
So the book embraces the Gatsby-esque notion that you can never outrun your past, as well as the common-sense notion that you shouldn't look back because you never know what's gaining on you. The title works on a couple of levels, too.
So I read "Killing Time" sort of as a stroll down memory lane, and I saw much that was familiar in terms of places, things and people. The characters seemed a bit gregarious in contrast to what I remember about Central Minnesotans, but the authors accurately captured the cliques and groups you'd expect in an insular and small town. Also, I heard every word in that German-Canadian-Scandinavian-influenced accent.
Bear in mind this is also a murder mystery, so I kept my spidey sense alert to the clues dropped along the way; the murder doesn't happen until two-thirds of the way through the book, thus the authors spend that time giving all the principles a motive to commit a murder — as well as a reason why each might need killing. In that way, the authors did well in developing the characters and tying them to each other while dropping hints at their sinister pasts. After all, everybody went to high school together and no one can seem to let go of a slight.
So the book embraces the Gatsby-esque notion that you can never outrun your past, as well as the common-sense notion that you shouldn't look back because you never know what's gaining on you. The title works on a couple of levels, too.
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