When you read the title of this book you don’t know who does it refer to; is it the man in cuffs who has to stay in a prison for 20 years or the woman who will host him after he has killed her husband?
I really liked this ambiguity, in Catalan the names are feminine or masculine but in English they are neutral, making it interesting to discern who is referring to by this adjective. Because, let’s be honest, you have to be very brave to have in your own home the man who has killed your husband, taking care of him and giving him food. This is the world Hannah will have to live in for the next 20 years, he loved her husband but Jem killed him in a failed robbery, why? She can’t stay to ask questions till she discovers the real truth, a dark truth that will mark her forever.
This is a book to make you think about society and convicts, I really didn’t like the option that this book presented, that when someone commits a crime the person that was affected has to live and take care of the convict. It seems a way to keep the prisons free and everyone able to do whatever they want without the punishment they deserve. But this book touches other interesting themes that will keep any reader thinking; affairs, pregnancy, love… A slow paced story with a closed ending but with so many important points in it that it will be impossible to stop thinking about it.
So, expect a deep and intricate story, impossible to put down, believe me!
I really liked this ambiguity, in Catalan the names are feminine or masculine but in English they are neutral, making it interesting to discern who is referring to by this adjective. Because, let’s be honest, you have to be very brave to have in your own home the man who has killed your husband, taking care of him and giving him food. This is the world Hannah will have to live in for the next 20 years, he loved her husband but Jem killed him in a failed robbery, why? She can’t stay to ask questions till she discovers the real truth, a dark truth that will mark her forever.
This is a book to make you think about society and convicts, I really didn’t like the option that this book presented, that when someone commits a crime the person that was affected has to live and take care of the convict. It seems a way to keep the prisons free and everyone able to do whatever they want without the punishment they deserve. But this book touches other interesting themes that will keep any reader thinking; affairs, pregnancy, love… A slow paced story with a closed ending but with so many important points in it that it will be impossible to stop thinking about it.
So, expect a deep and intricate story, impossible to put down, believe me!