Three Hours

Three hours, this refers to the time frame in which the book is set and involves a school shooting. This is a tough subject and I think it's done, on the whole, quite well. The POV switches around between different characters, school kids, teachers, police, parents and I found this effected the pacing a bit especially at the beginning. Basically, the whole thing is about fear and how different people react to an extraordinary event. I'm not going to lie, some of the actions some of the people involved (one group of people in particular) are really quite bizarre and that did spoil it for me a little. However, what would I know about how people would react to something like this, I would probably be hiding in a peeing my pants.

the parallels drawn to another literary work cheapened the plot and the gritty reality of the story for me. i also went in thinking this would be a quick but impactful read, however it took a while to push through. this is an extremely heavy book!! it is NOT a thriller like it is marketed as. 

And here you have a book I didn't give much hope to: after We need to talk about Kevin, it seems nobody will ever have the same flair. But Rosamund Lupton does a fine job of keeping us in our toes, while bringing up a touch of the American reality few people seem to understand. It kept me guessing, cheering and thinking after I was done - much more than I expected when I picked it up.