Review: Atonement, Ian McEwan

Title: Atonement
Author: Ian McEwan
Finished reading: January 16th, 2016
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

What I thought about it:
Briony is little girl with a very fertile imagination. One day, she witnesses a strange scene between her sister and the son of one of the family’s servants. This triggers a series of events that will change all of them forever.
I loved how McEwan played with the notion of appearances. Briony’s innocence and lack of understanding of the grown-up world leads her to create a story around what she saw. She doesn’t have the full story so she fills in the blanks, as people often do, although this time, the consequences are huge. I really enjoyed the different point of views on what had happened, and even if I guessed how it would turn out rather quickly. The first part ended quite abruptly, I wish I’d seen more about the aftermath of Robbie’s “departure”.
The writing gives a vivid image of everything, which is perfect to imagine the beautiful scenery of the first part, but my faint-hearted self was not as glad about the detailed and powerful images when it came to the many descriptions in the last two parts. This explains why I enjoyed much less reading them.
Still, I had a great time reading this book, especially because of the powerful and beautiful writing. I will definitely check out other books from McEwan.