Review: Raven by Tim Pearsall

Review: Raven by Tim Pearsall 

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I was introduced to Tim Pearsall’s work some time ago when I read and reviewed a short story collection he wrote. While I didn’t love everything about the book, there were some concepts that I found intriguing in the work.

Similarly, here, I like the idea Pearsall is working with in this longer narrative form. While I do see problems with the execution of the story, I must admit that I really like the premise and some of the characters are very interesting!

Before I go into it further, let’s get a summary for the story. 

Summary

Raven has spent her life committing many crimes. In present-day London, however, she learns that a young couple, Richard and Susan, are out for revenge because she committed crimes that affected their lives directly. As time goes on, with Richard and Susan both closing in on her, Raven finds that there are also people out there looking to aid her in surviving being hunted. 

Will Richard and Susan be able to avenge the victims of Raven’s crimes? 

Thoughts

There is something about the concepts presented in the story that are very interesting! Seeing Richard and Susan get tied up in this hunt for Raven, only for the stakes to become very personal as time goes on, is amazing to see! On the other side, seeing people be sympathetic toward Raven and wanting to aid her in whatever she does suggests that there is more to her than just a clear-cut antagonistic character. I’ll discuss that further in the character section.

Despite the interesting characters and plot, however, I do see some issues with how the story is executed. The narrative can be a bit difficult to follow at times and, while the goals of the main characters are clear-cut, the prose wasn’t always easy to follow. I’ll discuss this further in the writing section. 

That said, let’s dive in and discuss some of the characters!

Characters

Richard and Susan Bryant

I have mixed feelings about Susan. While I understand her personal motives, I admit to having felt overwhelmed by how far she took the hunt. Both she and Richard have legitimate reasons to hate Raven, but Susan takes her animosity so far that it is difficult to watch. She is not keeping a clear head in her quest for revenge and seeing her continue this way became both disturbing and annoying after a while. 

As for Richard, I found myself feeling bad for him because of all of this. The way he became enmeshed in this conflict with Raven also gave him a clear motive, but he reacted to it differently than Susan. I feel like, compared to Susan, he is much calmer. This made it easier for me to sympathize with his motives more. That said, seeing his dreams and how he reacts to them makes it clear that he is just as affected by this as Susan is – he just responds to it differently. 

Raven

I admit, I do not fully understand what Raven is. There is something about her that I cannot quite put my finger on. Going in, I expected her to be a specific supernatural creature, but I feel I have no evidence that my assumption was correct even after finishing the story. I know more about her past and present relationships than I do about Raven herself, and I wish her story had been clearer. What is she? We do see a situation that suggests what she is, but is that situation the truth? 

Besides that, the way her personality is presented is as clear as day. I love how seductive she is on the surface, lulling targets into a false sense of security before striking. She is presented as dangerous, but alluring, and I like that she has people out there firmly on her side as well as those that want her to pay for her crimes. While on the topic of her personality, I also find her relationship with her daughter Cairo to be interesting, and it shows another side to her that I did not expect to see. There is an interesting dynamic between the two of them that I enjoyed seeing unfold. 

Walther Von Vohberg 

Walther is probably one of my favorite characters in this. I love that, despite his goals, he shows clear care and concern for Richard and Susan to the point where he worries about their safety. His motives for getting involved are incredibly sympathetic as well, making it easy to understand where he is coming from and what exactly he will get out of his quest in the story. 

I also like that he is not entirely confident in his decisions. This shows a degree of care for Richard and Susan that was nice to see. Despite how much he wants revenge for what happened, he is aware of what that may mean for the people he brings in to help him, even when those people are after Raven as well.

Structure

The structure of this story is interesting. The narrative is built from multiple points of view, often focusing on characters’ perspectives in more intimate detail. This works in painting Raven as more than just a one-note antagonist, but it also helps in presenting her benefactor’s home as even more dangerous than it first appears. On the other side, we have the stories of Richard, Susan, and Walther. The structure aids Susan’s arc really well, as Richard watches from a distance and only becomes more concerned for her as their relationship begins to be affected by everything happening. 

However, I do see some issues with the structure as well. Unfortunately, going through so many different points of view does not entirely work in fleshing out all the characters’ stories, and I feel like I often forgot where one plotline left off after reading from other viewpoints. This suggests to me that there may be too many points of view to keep track of. For example, early in the story it is revealed that Richard’s workplace is in possession of a book that Raven is after for her benefactor, but all the different stories we see from other characters buried this plot line. As a result, it was easy to forget why Raven got tangled up with Richard. 

Writing

Unfortunately, I do see issues with the writing that affected how I experienced the story. Pearsall has enjoyable prose and interesting ideas, but the sentence structure needs work for the messages of the writing to be completely clear. For example, I noticed that when a character would speak, there sometimes weren’t tags to signify that they were speaking, or when a conversation had moved on to another character. This made dialogue particularly difficult to follow because it did not flow smoothly. 

Another thing I want to discuss is setup and payoff. I have talked about this many times before and it needs to be touched upon here. Unfortunately, I see issues with how situations are set up and then resolved. A lot of the situations in this story are set up beautifully, but the payoff that ideally should follow doesn’t land the way I was hoping for. One of the best examples of this is the situation with Raven’s benefactor. I feel like the story did not deliver on the payoff of his arc, and it was underwhelming as a result. It felt like the story was suggesting something different was going to occur and then that did not happen, leaving me feeling disappointed, as I felt the plot line being hinted at had significant potential. 

Conclusion

I hate when I have mixed feelings about a story. I see a very interesting idea being played with in this narrative and the Gothic backdrop makes for a highly intriguing setting, but unfortunately, I think there are too many aspects of the story that didn’t deliver the experience I was hoping for. For this reason, I must admit that this story just didn’t work for me.