The Naming of the Birds by Paraic O'Donnell

Gratitude

Thank you to Good Reads Giveaways and Zando Projects for the review copy of The Naming of the Birds, which I received with the expectation of a fair and honest review.

Description

In the first part of The Naming of the Birds, we are introduced to a girl, an orphan who has been raised in an asylum, but was taken from the asylum after a terrible fire, and brought to a new home where she and the other children were trained and toughened. In the second part of the book, we sit on the shoulder of Sergeant Gideon Bliss, a cautious and anxious man who works with Inspector Henry Cutter, who we are to understand is unorthodox in his methods, grumpy, and brilliant, always leaping ahead of everyone else. Bliss is just trying to keep up and understand Cutter’s mysterious ways. Octavia Hillingdon will join the party, a journalist from the higher set. Together, they will work together to solve a series of murders committed by an exceptionally skilled assassin.

Would I teach this book?

Would I teach The Naming of the Birds? An excellent question goes, and the answer would depend on the class. In a genre class, it would be a possibility–a period mystery set in 1800s England. It might make a good discussion for a book club as well.

There are aspects of the book which I find quite problematic, including a moral ambiguity that is so barely acknowledged that it almost seems not an ambiguity at all. Yet, the characters acknowledge the ambiguity without further challenge. It is like a whipped cream pie that falls on the floor instead of in the clown’s face. Not the best look.

The set up of the whodunnit is also interesting and reveal also feels a bit like the splatted pie. Still, the relationships between the characters are nuanced and puzzling, and the revenge feels well meted out.


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