(36) I can't remember what drew me to this book but somehow, sometime over the last year I purchased it. It is a fiction based on the true story of an explosion at an oil drilling site in Trinidad in the 1940's maybe where several of the main characters were killed. Two of the owners of the site just so happened to be involved in a love triangle before their untimely demise. The book is a story of good timing, good luck, hard work and fleeting happiness. You wanted more for the characters but I guess truth is stranger than fiction and the author made reasonable aesthetic choices.

Some of the prose was really quite good - I think the foods and smells of Trinidad and the Caribbean, the sights and smells on the Kushi estate, some intimate details about Ada were well rendered. There was quite an atmosphere of an inevitable tragic build that became almost unbearable as there were less and less pages to read. That was well-done. I think it will stick in my mind for some time and was a bit haunting. But in the end, something seemed to be missing that I can't put my finger on. Some angle that wasn't quite right. If it is supposed to be a bit of narrative non-fiction then give us more info about the history of the oil industry and/or Trinidad. If it is all fictional, then don't let the truth of what happened limit the story-telling. We could have read more about the characters backstories or perhaps had more intrigue and/or character arc development before the final tragedy.

Not sure where this recommendation came from - I think it is a small publisher and it seems I got a signed copy and another book by the company thrown in for free. So that's fun. It was pretty good - started slow but built into an interesting read. ( )