How do you review a book that was not written for you?

This is the second novel by Jana Beňová I’ve read, and I was not a fan of the first, Seeing People Off. While I enjoyed Away! Away! marginally more, it was not something I would have read past the first two pages had I not made the (admittedly arbitrary) commitment to read every Slovak novel in English I could find.

But this time, it doesn’t seem quite fair to complain that the book has no plot to speak of, nor characters and emotions that compel me in the slightest. It is not meant to be that kind of book, so it’s a trifle unjust to charge it with failure. This time I’m trying to meet it where it’s at…