Review: The Rain Watcher by Tatiana de Rosnay

The Rain Watcher

by Tatiana de Rosnay

Publisher: St Martin's Press

Pages: 240

Format: eARC

Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  The Rain Watcher is a powerful family drama set in Paris as the Malegarde family gathers to celebrate the father's 70th birthday. Their hidden fears and secrets are slowly unraveled as the City of Light undergoes a stunning natural disaster. Seen through the eyes of charismatic photographer Linden Malegarde, the youngest son, all members of the family will have to fight to keep their unity against tragic circumstances.


Kritters Thoughts:  A book that centers around a family who has come together to celebrate in Paris, but the weather and circumstances make this celebration a little more dramatic that it should be.  Paul and Lauren wanted a weekend in Paris with their two children and no one else, so Talia and Linden meet them in Paris.  

The weather was almost a character of its own in this book.  With rain and a threat of flood, the weekend goes downhill fast.  I had a hard time getting into the setting of this book, I kept having to look up pictures to really picture how this rain and flood could affect the city and these characters.  

The writing was just ok for me in this book.  There were times when I was hooked on the story and loving it, but then the story would go somewhere and I couldn't figure out how that worked with the bigger picture.  There seemed to be moments where I didn't feel as though it added anything to the central story of Paul and Lauren and their children.  The long chapters and long paragraphs made the pacing not work for me and I couldn't get completely hooked on the characters or the story.

It has been awhile since I read Sarah's Key, so I will say my view may be a bit flawed, but this book felt so different from that one.  I remember not being able to put Sarah's Key down and this wasn't the case with this one.  

If you are a reader who likes more lyrical less literal then you could disagree with my view and love this one.  


Rating: enjoyable, but didn't leave me wanting more

Ebook 2018 Challenge: 86 out of 100

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from Netgalley.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.