The Feast - Margaret Kennedy

 

I like to think that most of my reviews are really positive, as I'm pretty good at choosing books which I think I'll get on with. This, sadly, is an exception! I bought Margaret Kennedy's The Feast on a bit of a whim whilst in Edinburgh, and it unfortunately was highly disappointing for me. In fact, I think this is the first book I have ever added to my DNF ('did not finish') shelf!

The book was written in the mid-20th Century, and is set on the Cornish coast. It was originally published as a short story in a women's magazine, and if I'm honest I think that the short version is probably much better. The problem with this novel is that after 200 pages, still nothing had happened. This sort of thing has definitely happened to me before, where I've felt that there was no real event in the story, most memorably with The Essex Serpent by Sara Perry. The blurb was misleading in my opinion, and what I expected to be a thrilling fantasy about a giant snake terrorising the streets ended up being fairly nondescript. 

This was much the same - the blurb sold a tale of a crumbling hotel filled with eccentric guests who succumb to a fatal avalanche which crushes the hotel. The unusual dynamics of the group of people and the unexpected travesty suggested that perhaps something was amiss, leading me to expect something of an Agatha Christie-esque thriller. This is definitely more of a character-led novel, though I found that since there were so many of them and none were particularly charismatic, I couldn't remember who each person even was!

To sum up, having read about half of this novel I was utterly bored and despondent. There is a large cast of characters, not one of which I connected with at all, and I really didn't feel excited about picking this book up. In the past I have always persevered with things, with the aim to try and see the good in every book. I've come to the conclusion that life is too bloody short!