Book Club Debate: Did the Twist Ruin the Novel?

Right, shall we start before the biscuits run out?

Yes! I've been dying to talk about that ending!

Ugh, the ending. Don't get me started.

Oh, come on! You didn't actually hate it?

Hate's a strong word. I felt thoroughly hoodwinked.

Three hundred pages, and the narrator was dead all along?

That's not a twist, it's a cheap conjuring trick.

Hang on. The clues were there from chapter one.

The cold tea, the neighbour who never looks at her!

Ah, so the foreshadowing was hiding in plain sight?

Clues you only notice in hindsight aren't foreshadowing.

They're retrofitted to excuse the author's sleight of hand.

Retrofitted? I spotted the tea on my first read!

Then you're either a genius or you skipped ahead.

Oh, I'll take genius, thank you very much.

Can I play devil's advocate for a moment?

The narrator was unreliable from the outset, wasn't she?

Isn't the real question whether she was lying to herself?

Hmm... that's a more generous reading, I'll grant you.

So the twist is about denial, not just plot?

Exactly! The whole book is about grief she can't face!

But what if every clumsy plot becomes 'deliberate ambiguity'?

Ah, the eternal refuge of the overrated novelist.

Oh, don't you start as well!

Sorry, sorry! I couldn't resist stirring the pot.

Look, I'll concede the prose was exquisite,

but the ending still felt unearned to me.

Oh... I found it quietly devastating, honestly.

Then let's simply agree to disagree, shall we?

Fine. As long as it's minuted that I'm right.

Right! So, what are we reading next month?

Anything without a twist, please. Perhaps a memoir?

Memoirs have the least reliable narrators of all.

Ha! Fine, the memoir it is. Same time next month?

Same time. And I'm bringing better biscuits.