It was certainly an interesting concept to have the story told retrospectively to another person; it was good to have an insight into what the protagonist was thinking at the time, and compare his views to those of an outsider. I enjoyed the very short chapters as it breaks the story down into manageable chunks. For me, there were too many excessively big or obscure words which needed looking up in a dictionary - this always strikes me as unnecessary and breaks the flow of the story.
Regarding the story, I was expecting something really bad to have happened to make Jeff wish he'd never saved Francis from drowning, but besides Francis not being the nicest of blokes, Jeff seemed to gain quite a lot from meeting Francis (a lifelong relationship and career) so in my view it seemed odd that this was the overall theme of the book.
The final twist in the book was unexpected but also raised more questions than it answered - Francis didn't seem that bad a guy to me.
All in all, it was definitely a different book to others I've read, but sadly the story didn't grab me.
Regarding the story, I was expecting something really bad to have happened to make Jeff wish he'd never saved Francis from drowning, but besides Francis not being the nicest of blokes, Jeff seemed to gain quite a lot from meeting Francis (a lifelong relationship and career) so in my view it seemed odd that this was the overall theme of the book.
The final twist in the book was unexpected but also raised more questions than it answered - Francis didn't seem that bad a guy to me.
All in all, it was definitely a different book to others I've read, but sadly the story didn't grab me.