IN A COMMON HOUR by Sita Walker

Full disclosure: I purchased this book for the sole purpose of examining the structure, after discovering that the whole novel is set over a time period of just one hour. I wanted to see how the author managed it. What I discovered is that she achieved it with finely-crafted, exquisite skill.

Walker etches characters with a sharp razor:

Sue Sanders. Immaculate blow-dry. Fourteen diamond rings. So old she still marked kids down for splitting infinitives and ending their sentences with prepositions.

Landscapes are perfectly rendered:

The gullied wilderness stretched out through suburbia like a grey-green lung, breathing for the city.

I will have to read it a second time to fully study the structure; on the first read, I was far too engrossed in the story. There’s an attention to detail between the lines that give this novel a completeness, even while the reader’s brain might roil with questions.