The Lost Book of Eleanor Dare is one of those books that I absolutely promise I really tried to love. The concept was great and I was highly intrigued by the synopsis. However, I was disappointed that much of it fell flat. While Alices’s decisions made more sense as the story goes along, it doesn’t make her less whiny. It took far too long for me to connect with her problems and attempts at solutions. The disconnect may have stemmed from a hard time distinguishing what was memory, what was thought, and what was actually happening. Penn’s chapters were much easier for me to follow because, although she had a lot of turmoil in her heart, she had a clear goal and ways to accomplish that goal. The progression of her character was both interesting and believable.
The synopsis promised a connection to the Lost Colony of Roanoke and it didn’t come until much further into the story than expected. It was only finding out more about that part of the story that kept me going. Once those chapters started appearing more frequently, the story moved at a faster pace.
One of the most compelling parts of the novel was the complexities of life and culture in the south. The settings and characters outside of our main characters were beautifully written. I love a story that has characters outside of the main characters that are fully flushed out. This was one of those books that I could fully immerse myself in whenever there were sections of description. I had a harder time with the person to person interaction.
Normally, I would provide a short synopsis with this review, but this is such a complex novel that I feel I would be doing a disservice by giving it only a few sentences.
⅗ stars
Thank you to Netgalley and Harper Muse for allowing me to read this eARC in exchange for my honest opinions.
The Novel Llama 