Book Review - The House of Rumour - Jake Arnott

"In 1941, Larry Zargorski was a naive young writer of science fiction. Seven decades on, he looks back on that crucial year and traces his place in a mysterious web - one that connects the Second World War with the Space Age, stretches from London to Cuba and Southern California, and links Ian Fleming and Rudolf Hess in a conspiracy that reverberates in the present

Could this be the secret history of the 20th Century? In this thrilling tale of spies and propagandists, the conned and the heartbroken, dreamers and fanatics, the question is:

who will you believe?"

I really wanted to like this book but I really just couldn't get into it! It was a book that I really wanted to give up on at every moment I could but I persevered, hoping that it would grow on me and even as I finished the last page I was hoping that it was going to speak to me in some profound way. But, no, I finished the book and I still didn't get it. Don't get me wrong, the book is well written but I just didn't get the story that Arnott was trying to tell me. There were too many characters and their stories were so segmented that I couldn't really empathize with any of them. I didn't like any of the characters and to me that is an important part of any book. The plot also goes throughout time and space which I get is to do with the underlying motives and ideals of the whole book but it made it so hard to follow. I have read Slaughter House 5 which I really enjoyed and is a similar premise but I think in this case there are too many characters to make this idea work

Are there any books that you have read recently that you just don't get?