Hamad's Reviews > Water

I am a fan of Boyne's writing as he always seems to write complex characters and tackle complex issues while keeping the novel engaging and not overwhelming and this was the case here.

This is not exactly a novel, it is a novella falling just under 180 pages, but Boyne proves that a good writer can still deliver a great story in this number of pages. I think Boyne could easily have stretched this into a full novel but what we got was still satisfactory.

From my small experience with Boyne's other books, you can tell that there are some subjects that he likes to talk about, and he does so elegantly. These include LGBT communities, sexism, religion and the church and how communities work in general.

Also, I have to say that the writing was smart because it gives the readers space to draw conclusions through threads that are presented without spoon-feeding them. This explains how such an impactful story was contained in a novella form. I was also pleasantly surprised by the fact that this is an elemental series with the next entry being called "Earth" featuring a character we were already introduced to in Water. I will be definitely keeping an eye on the rest of those novellas.