Review: A good intro sentence that catches immediate interest is always an asset, and Half-Inch had one. The story is built upon a woman who has fantasized of killing her abusive husband for years, and finally comes up with a plan to do so. Although I am aware of the psychological hold abusers can have over their victims, simply giving me fact after fact of what Bobby did, and what Pammy allowed or was forced to endure didn’t gain my empathy, so she never became a sympathetic character. When she begins meticulously detailing her plans to murder Bobby, it actually seemed a kind of overkill to me, and I questioned her sanity and some of the other people around her. But maybe that was the point of the story, the improbability of it all, because otherwise the premise didn’t seem realistic to me, and Pammy’s mentality seemed very immature and conscienceless. I can deal with having no remorse or feeling, but I have to experience a connection with a character to make it an “allowable” and justifiable act.
Other details just didn’t work for me either, the outstanding though perhaps minor one was of Pammy slamming into the steering wheel during a car crash and she screamed. I broke several ribs in a similar accident and know that you cannot scream, you can’t take a breath, because you have none to do exhale. Also, if you’ve slammed into a steering wheel as described in the accident, you will not be up doing the things Pammy did immediately following, nor even five days later appear to be perfectly fine.
Half-inch read like a newspaper article detailing the inside or back story of a convicted murderer and their rationalization of their crime, and in somewhat the same tone. I know it’s fiction, but it all seemed improbable to me, law enforcement right there and absolutely nothing being done, no suspicion or anything else. I think it’s a good story idea, but with a different level of characterization it would have had greater impact to me.
Description: Pammy has had enough of Bobby, her abusive drunk of a husband. One lovely spring day, she decides to kill him, despite the fact that they will soon be divorced and he will, at least in the eyes of the law, be out of her life for good. Indulging in homicidal daydreams for years has led her to devise her own perfect and completely bizarre plan.
Source: Author
Red Haircrow Review 