Book Review #55: When The Curtain Falls by Carrie Hope Fletcher

Hey Guys x

Sorry it's been so long since my last review! I spent the month before reading this, re-reading the 'Twilight' book series and falling back in love with it. Yeah, it might be bad or problematic to some, but it's a great piece of escapism and I'm glad that I had the time to read it again. But then, I got started with this one.

If you've read my blog in the past, you might know that I'm a huge fan of Carrie Hope Fletcher as a person and a YouTuber, but this is going to be a completely unbiased review.

This book is about a play called 'When The Curtain Falls' that is taking place in two different times. The first time the production is done, we follow the love story of Fawn and Walter, an actress and the man that works behind the scenes. Their relationship is kept a secret and the fear of being caught is high. But in the theatre, nothing stays secret for long, and a tragedy happens as a result.
70 years later and the production is back. Only this time, we're following the budding relationship of actor and actress Olive and Oscar, as they figure out what they are, while also figuring out the play that they are a part of. However, the tragedy that occurred 70 years ago hangs over them - can they figure out the truth before tragedy strikes again?

I really wanted to love this book. I didn't quite understand how everything would work when I first read the description, so I was excited to see how everything would be laid out.

First of all, the structure was weird to me. The story goes back and forth between the two time periods, and I liked that because we were teased a bit at a time. However, while this worked really well for the Fawn/Walter story line, because there were big things that could only come out at the end, the Olive/Oscar story line was stopped and started at awkward times, which I think happened because nothing big really happened in their story. As much as I hate saying this, I would have rather read a whole book about Fawn and Walter - the other story line got really boring really quickly.

One of the reasons that it got boring, in my opinion, were because the characters of Olive and Oscar were two dimensional. Olive wasn't a character that I cared about, because she didn't do anything to make me care about her. She felt like a protagonist out of a 50s novel, rather than a present day girl. But then again, I don't know what time period the author was going for, because there were times when the present day story line did feel like it was set 70 years previously.

One thing about Carrie's books is that they all contain an element of magic, and I think that this worked best in her third book, 'All That She Can See' (which I loved!) because the magic was present from the first moment. In both her second book, 'On The Other Side' and this one, it felt like the magic was thrown in near the end and made, what was otherwise a story with a realistic backdrop, far fetched and confusing. In this book, there was a scene right at the end that did this, pulling me completely out of the story.

One thing that really struck me about the story was that, while I could kind of see the way that the Oscar and Olive characters fell in love, I really didn't understand how Fawn and Walter even fell for each other. It's like, they saw each other one time and started having this epic love affair when in reality, they barely knew each other. For me, that was the only thing wrong with that story line, but it's kind of a big thing because the whole premise of their story is that they are in love and their love is being stopped by someone else. But I didn't believe in their love to begin with.

What was good?
As I've said, I was really invested in the story of Fawn and Walter. That part of the book didn't even feel like a romance novel, but like a thriller that you just had to get to the end of! I'd have loved to read a full length story about the two of them, maybe set in a more modern time period.

What was bad?
I've already mentioned the things that I didn't like about the story. I guess the only other thing that made me feel weird about the story is my own fault. Because I'm so familiar with Carrie, I couldn't help but picture her as I read it. And I don't mean picture her as the characters, but think about her in the writing. Like, if I liked a particular paragraph, I'd think 'Carrie did so well here', and if I didn't, I'd think 'Ooh, I wonder why she wrote it like that'. So in a way, it didn't feel like reading a novel, but like reading a friend's piece of work. And again, this isn't a reflection on Carrie at all, but rather my familiarity with her. Having said that, I don't think that this would have made a difference to how much I enjoyed the story.

Overall
If you're a fan of Carrie, an aspiring writer, a lover of love-at-first-sight or just looking for something different, maybe give this a try and see what you think of it - but if not, I'd give this a skip and read 'All That She Can See' by Carrie instead. It's my favourite of hers and I think that it's some of her best work!

2/5 Stars!

Lou