I think Abrams’ ability to “spin” keeps the book afloat and makes it a page turner. In my opinion, it’s the plot that drives the book, not character development. And yes, the plot is overly complicated–as @stradmom and @mathmom pointed out–but it kept me wanting to see how it would all come together at the end.
The New York Times gave the novel a mixed review. On the one hand, the reviewer said, “In page after page of efficient and serviceable prose, Abrams creates an exceedingly convoluted but potentially intriguing landscape” and:
…one is struck by Abrams’s considerable powers of invention. Not only does she succeed in keeping the pages turning, but the fusillade she triggers bespeaks a genuine gift for weaving a daunting number of plot threads into her labyrinthine but accelerating design. Her narrative never pauses for breath — let alone contemplation.
But at the same time, the reviewer felt that the novel fell short, that the characters had skills (over-the-top genius ones, at times) that “are functional rather than organic. Too often, Avery and her supporting cast are whomever the story requires them to be.” He adds:
Readers searching for dimensional characters whose inner lives inform a consistently credible narrative won’t find them in this book; its climactic events, and the behaviors of the principals, require a particularly willful suspension of disbelief.
I don’t disagree. Ling and Noah are useful tools, but there was barely a back story for either of them. And I really didn’t like the way Rita was written. The bad guys are pretty stock characters (I just knew that it would come out that Stokes had killed the former president). Even so, I got what I came for: “Abrams has realized what surely was her chief ambition — not to enlighten, but to entertain.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/11/books/review/while-justice-sleeps-stacey-abrams.html