Gillian Linden

Fiction 2024 | 160 pages

For once, I am aligned with Goodreads.  Negative Space earned an unimpressive 3.29 average rating.  It may be the lowest I have ever seen.

While I like the author's style with language and her pace in this debut novel, it is BORING!  It is one week in the life of a part-time schoolteacher in New York, just as the pandemic restrictions were winding down.  The two major themes in the book revolve around the main character possibly seeing an inappropriate interaction between a teacher and a student (she believes they touched heads), and her young daughter Jane's coping with infected gums that require the extraction of some of her baby teeth.

Negative Space is a negative read.  It is not worth your time.  There is nothing there.

December 2024