A review by thishannah
Linden Hills by Gloria Naylor

From the premise, I was expecting a straightforward high-society drama with gossip, backstabbing, and social commentary. But the actual story was much darker and stranger, and the allegorical layer really elevated the reading experience for me. I only found out halfway through that the book is based on Dante's Inferno, and once I learned that, so many things about the book's tone and structure fell into place. I am not really familiar with Inferno beyond the surface level, so I loved that Linden Hills inspired me to dig deeper into another classic. The combination of the antiquated story structure with 1980s stylings worked really well, and Hell was a perfect metaphor for the traps of wealth and "success" that cost people their souls.