Review: The Night Swim

The Night Swim by Megan Goldin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

It’s been far too long since I’ve encountered a five-star read, though it’s not been for lack of trying. This year, I’ve scoured reviews and read dozens of books that others rave about, only to be disappointed in not only public sentiment but also the bar that seems to have been lowered in order to award that prestigious top-shelf rating. Finally, FINALLY, I’m able to join the majority in heralding a breakthrough. The Night Swim was, indeed, a read worthy of all five stars.

The book is a tale of two halves—two meticulously married plots running along parallel tracks until in the final moments their paths converge. I can’t say there were any real surprises here for me, so it wasn’t necessarily the story itself that warrants the rating. What earned those stars was the craftsmanship of the writing. Author Megan Goldin brilliantly develops just enough of her characters to lure us in, leaving the question of guilt or innocence to the reader’s discretion, but not without her chumming the waters. She tells a modern day tale of a young girl accusing a hometown hero of rape. At face value, this storyline is presented without bias—a reiteration of the facts of the case as presented at trial. The second plot, however, is emotion-laden and portrays the tragic story of a young girl who, 25 years earlier, perished—the townsfolk calling it an accidental drowning, her younger sister insisting it was murder. As the two plots unfold, the circumstances surrounding the second story brilliantly and almost imperceptibly color the reader’s perceptions of the first. The reader’s anger at a misogynistic society that thrives on victim-blaming is stoked to a fiery blaze that carries over as the plot focus swings back and forth. This imprinting on the reader renders one hard-pressed to separate one victim from the other, assigning unassailable guilt to the golden boy accused of viciously and brutally raping his young victim, long before the evidence is heard and the final verdict revealed.

For anyone who finds brilliant writing to sometimes be more important and enjoyable than the content itself, this book is a MUST read. To be fair, at its heart, the story stands on its own merits as a mediocre legal thriller. Couple it with Goldin’s incredible talent, however, and what emerges is a book worthy of all the stars.

View all my reviews