Ladder in the Moon Light

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Category:	Fiction
Author:	Ana Ingham
Publisher:	Pen Press
Price:	£6.99
ISBN:	9781906206352
Pages:	186
Reviewed in issue:	9

The sad fact is that cancer touches so many of our lives these days, and so Ana Ingham has certainly chosen a poignant enough subject on which to ground her novel.

Ben and Suzan have been separated for some time when Ben is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Whilst it will inevitably tear them apart, at least in this world, this terrible illness reignites the flame of their love. The subject is indeed an emotional one, but unfortunately I found that the book did not evoke the feelings it should have. The characters themselves were very hard to empathise with as they felt very flat and unreal.

One of the main complaints I have with the book is the dialogue – it is so unnatural and stilted in its delivery that it makes the book itself very hard to read, and as dialogue is one of the main ways we get to know a character, this could be a large part of the problem with the character realisation. Although readers don’t want all the ‘umms’ and ‘errrs’ that make up everyday conversation, they do want something that sounds natural. The author fails to deliver on this point and it really does damage any entertainment the book might otherwise offer.

There were a few typos within the text, but aside from that, the production of the book itself looks to be of a high quality with a pleasing, interesting cover. The binding is strong and the text itself is very nicely presented.

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