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people found this helpful, as of 2023
ranked #160,618 most helpful
out of 571,544,897 reviews
★☆☆☆☆
Nothing to do with a Miniaturist. Should have been titled Homosexual Persecution in 16th Century Amsterdam
Why bother to title the book, "The Miniaturist" when the story has almost nothing to do with the miniaturist? One and a half pages to tell her story, as if revealing that much would be enough. The Miniaturist carves figures that seem to predict future events about the characters lives, but we never know why or how they're carved, just that they are. For 1-2 pages. And why bother to flesh out the contents of Marin's bedroom if they serve no purpose? Marin, Nella's sister-in-law, has a bedroom that is full of maps and documents and secret things that we are led to over and over. Why did she have them? What was she charting? Did it have to do with her brother's business, Otto's travels, places she'd been to, would like to go to? Nothing in the book serves any purpose to the story. It should have been titled, How Homosexuals Were Persecuted in 16th Century Amsterdam, for the book was nothing more than unanswered questions and loose ends leading nowhere in order to showcase the constant the sorrow of hiding homosexuality. What a waste of what cold have been a really awesome mystery.
