Book Review | Under Her Care

Rating ⭐

Initial reaction: I don't know how this book is rated so highly. Terrible dialogue and idiot characters, not to mention mistakes that editors should have noticed. Blech. Thank goodness this nonsense was free.

First of all, this book is definitely NOT a thriller. The mayor's wife gets murdered, and so technically the book is about a mom insisting her autistic son could not have committed the brutal crime, and that there is a Monster out there who did it and is now stalking her, but you will not give a shit about any of that because the whole book is just so painfully stupid.

Genevieve Hill and her 14 year old son Mason were out walking and Mason stumbles upon the dead body of Annabelle, the mayor's wife. I don't even remember her last name, or if that was even given. This takes place in Tuscaloosa, Alabama and the author wants us to believe that this city of 100,000 people is such a small town that everyone knows everyone else's business.

Genevieve is a former beauty pageant queen but has devoted her life to her son as it became clear he was autistic...at six.

Um, no. That does not happen, not that late.

Luckily our wonderful main character and 'autism whisperer' (no really, the detective called her that) Casey Walker realizes something is up because Autism is diagnosed far earlier than six.

Except Casey is also a fucking moron just like everyone else in the book. Morons and sociopaths. Definitely a winning combination.

So the detective on the case calls in Casey to help get Mason to talk, despite the fact that Mason is non-verbal. He's pretty shady himself and such a wiener throughout the whole book that I kind of wished Mason would smash his head with a rock, too.

Casey comes to all different kinds of conclusions and they all kind of make sense for a little while and then something else and then something else and then something else. She meets with Genevieve's daughter Savannah, who is also a piece of work, maybe, we don't know for a while. Then we do. Not a surprise.

The book is told from the perspective of Casey and Genevieve, though we get Mason's from time to time, though it is never labeled as his. Those sections are just titled "Then". At the end we get Savannah's, which was just as pointless as the rest of the book.

Spoiler ahead: Turns out the mom MADE Mason autistic, basically. She says she thought he was pretty boring and average, and she would make him 'extraordinary'. EXTRAORDINARY.

What. The. Fuck.

She basically gave him a bunch of meds and trained him to fail tests in a certain way that would ensure he received a certain score, which would determine that he was autistic.

And when you as the reader find this out, you should be appalled, right? Should be, except you aren't, because that seems exactly like something this lunatic would do to her son.

Casey is also a piece of work but in a different way. She was strictly there to educate about autism, but she didn't even do that well. She was not involved in the investigation in any way except to be a puppet for the detective (the only one on the case? Again, the author was trying to make Tuscaloosa sound small. It's not).

She basically fumbled around making random discoveries and told the detective who sometimes listened but most times didn't. She talks to her dad about the case a lot and that's just as pointless as everything else she does.

I have a big issue with the main character comparing autism and cancer. Cancer is a deadly disease that claims countless lives every single day. Autism is not. People with autism are not broken or unusual. They have a different neurotype.

The dialogue was awful. The phrasing at many times was awful. In general, the writing was clunky and weird. I'm also pretty sure the book never saw an editor.

I will leave you with a couple examples before I say this book is stupid and you shouldn't bother with it, even though it is free with Prime this month:

At one point the author describes another character as "head of the school newspaper and a star player on the debate team." You mean editor-in-chief? How is one a star player on a debate team? Captain, probably, if they're that good.

Here's my favorite: she talks about another character being drafted by Alabama and how he "became their golden boy until he tore his ACL sophomore year." I'm sorry, what? Despite what Alabama fans thinks, Bama is not a pro team. Colleges don't draft players. They recruit them, though. Did you mean that? I think you meant that.

Savannah talking about Mason: "He did get really sick once, and I'm pretty sure it was around that time, but I could be wrong. Everything's filtered though my little-girl memory, so it's hard to say, but I remember him getting really sick." Who talks like that? Such weird phrasing.

And lastly, "He's thriving ever since he got put under Blanche's care." He GOT PUT? GOT PUT??!! You mean "since he was placed in Blanche's care"?

There's more, but I can't waste any more time on this, and neither should you.

Not recommended even a little bit remotely at all.

Prime First Reads | The Receptionist

 

Rating ⭐⭐

When one possible sociopath (the wife) and another definite sociopath (the affair) cross paths because they are in relationships with the same man, this is what happens...

Nothing.

At least, nothing for a majority of the book. The intro was gripping and I expected the majority of the book to keep my attention in some kind of way. It did not. It was basically the husband being a lying, cheating, drug-addicted douchebag, the all-knowing wife planning on how to exit the marriage while lamenting her pregnancy, and the affair being a fucking weirdo ON TOP of being a sociopath who beat the bejeezus out of her grandmother many years ago, after her mom at one time tried to kill her with a knife.

The ending was incredibly cheap. It was not the shock that I think the author hoped it would be. I was left incredibly annoyed by what was happening when my suspicions were confirmed during the 911 call made by the wife, which had actually been introduced in the very beginning though at that point we did not know who made the call.

The epilogue, written by the daughter as her diary, wrapped everything up and she is the only character I felt anything for. This poor girl has to live with the entire town knowing what happened to her parents - at least, what the evidence looked like. The "official" story is not the actual truth, but no one will ever know that.

I've said before that I enjoy unreliable narrators. Sociopaths are sometimes the best kinds.

But the author really ruined it with the ending.

If you can get it for free and are still interested, have at it. Otherwise, pass. Basically, don't pay for this one.

Prime First Reads | The Darkest Flower

 

Rating ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I am so pleased to announce that a Prime First Reads book this month did not suck! In fact, this book was deliciously twisty.

I love unreliable narrators and I wouldn't necessarily call Kira that because she is very upfront with the reader about who she is, but she is definitely a sociopath.

I like that the book was told in alternating perspectives: Kira's and Alison Barton's, the attorney she hires to defend her.

The budding romance between Alison and her opposing council added a touch of sweetness to this dark story. Not that the story needed to have anything sweet added to it, but it was enough without going overboard.

I knew fairly early on who the wanna-be killer was, but I didn't know the how or why. As it turns out, I didn't know who the intended victim actually was. That made for an insanely malicious twist I was not expecting but should have.

Character development was well-done, even the secondary characters. None of the PTA moms blended together, they all had their own voices and stood out. The author did a great job in shining a spotlight on every single one who had the motive and opportunity - and access to the means - to attempt to murder a fellow PTA Mom.

It is a lightweight in terms of the legalese and courtroom time, which was fine with me. Definitely not a legal thriller if that is what you are looking for.

Kira remains intriguing. She's a terrible person, no question about it. She has quite a bit of depth though, and is incredibly well-developed. We see quickly how her childhood shaped her and her outlook. She has no issues whatsoever with going after what she thinks her children deserve, all while internally complaining about them. She will not only push boundaries, but she walks confidently up to them with a sledgehammer and smashes them to pieces.

This is book one in a new series, so I may be looking for others in the future. Hopefully they live up to this one!

Prime First Reads | The Perfect Marriage

 

Rating ⭐⭐

Oh Prime, how you have disappointed me with your First Reads offering once again.

We are told a lot that Jessica and James have the perfect marriage even though they're both terrible people because they cheated on their spouses when they met and fell hopelessly in love, or whatever.

The problem is we never really get to know most of the characters because they are flat and boring.

Even Haley, the psychotic stalker ex-wife is boring.

And it comes down to the fact that they are all boring, because everything they do is predictable.

We hear all about how Jessica's ex-husband Wayne grew up with a shitty dad who beat on him and his mom, but Wayne hides his rage well. We never see it though, we are only told about it.

We hear about how in love James and Jessica are, and how this marriage is perfect because they are so in love and so perfect for each other and  blah blah fucking blah.

Then there is Owen, Jessica and Wayne's son, whose cancer is in remission until it isn't. But we don't really get to know him either, because whatever, why would we need to?

It's not really a "twist" if the way you throw readers off the trail of the killer is literally by leaving said character out of most of the book. That's lazy and, once again, boring.

It becomes obvious who the killer is the minute Jessica and Wayne stop cooperating with the police. The explanation is at least a little interesting, but when the big climax of the story revolves around subpoenas for DNA samples...zzzzzzzzz.

Prime First Reads | The Last Resort

Rating ⭐

Oh good God, what did I just read?!?!

Okay, so I read it a while ago and am just getting to review it now, but shit. What absolute silly nonsense. Again, thank goodness that I got this for free from Prime First Reads, because I would be sooooooo pissed if I had paid any money for this.

Seven strangers are invited to this swanky island for an all-expenses-paid trip. They are from vastly different backgrounds, with a variety of ages, careers, etc. The group is supposed to be testing a new product from Timeo Technologies and all are into it - until it becomes clear that there are many secrets to be revealed. Each guest has a nasty secret of their own, all of which are broadcasted to the others by this new technology in the form of a memory-tracking device that they are all forced to wear.

So everyone is trapped hiking across the island to this supposed lavish party, but instead each secret is gradually revealed and they start dying one by one. I was so fucking thankful for that because they were all obnoxious and terrible people.

This book was such a let-down. I mainly gave it a try because And Then There Were None is one of my most favorite books of all-time. No author can even come close to doing what Dame Agatha Christie has done, but I still manage to give the books a try partly because I want a good thriller, but also because I like to see authors with nowhere near Christie's talent fall flat on their faces.

The unfortunate part here is that the book actually had such great potential but turned out to be a complete shit show. The ending was the most stupid and atrocious part and completely pointless, thus the book as a whole became pointless as well.

There is a super cryptic backstory that was as pointless as the ending, so it wasn't even a backstory at all. When you have to be that vague so as to provide 'suspense', you're doing something wrong.

I can definitely suspend belief for a bit if there is something else that hooks me - like characters I care about. But not one single character was actually likable. Literally none of them mattered except the main one and she was...blah. Had the writing been better, the outlandish and ridiculous story could have at least been fun, but alas, that too was not great.

The ending truly is what made this such a garbage book. Had it made any sense at all, or been connected in any kind of plausible or concrete way to anything that had happened along the way, my thoughts might be different. But seriously, it made NO SENSE. It really killed the book in a very final way, leaving me completely annoyed with having wasted the time and brain cells reading this. Had the plot holes been plugged, and had the book literally ended ANY OTHER WAY, this could be a three-star read. It was just so stupid and silly and ridiculous. But i think I mentioned that already, right?

Majorly NOT recommended.

Prime First Reads | Her Final Words

Rating ⭐⭐

I have had TERRIBLE luck lately with Prime's First Reads. I think I just have to accept that fact that YA thrillers will always be vastly superior to adult thrillers (mostly).

FBI Special Agent Lucy Thorne catches a case where the guilty party has asked for her by name. Eliza Cook confesses to murdering a twelve year old boy in her hometown. Then she says nothing at all and the readers are taken on a completely convoluted and stupid ride as Thorne tries to figure out WHY. She investigates, though is given limited time by her superiors, seeing as how they have the confession and don't really need the motive. Still, Thorne persists and man, this was a huge snoozefest. Less than halfway through, I did not care why, nor did I connect much to any of the characters. It's unfortunate, because in the beginning I was interested and I felt it was going smoothly. But the actual murder and the motive why - blech.

And don't even get me started on all the shifts in time. We go from now, to a couple weeks ago, then further back, forward again, back to now, blah blah blah. Half of it did not even matter - and there were more than a few characters who were also completely irrelevant, yet were forced into the story that would have likely been better off without them.

I don't mind stories told from multiple points of view, it can actually help when everyone is lying, so that is a positive that the book had going for it. Again, until I stopped caring about any of the characters because the author created a mystery where there was not one. Literally, there is no actual good reason for Eliza to keep her mouth shut about why she killed Noah. None, zilch, zero. Yet here we are.

The tight-knit religious community in the town are hush-hush and there are tons of secrets and everyone is lying, and DEAR GOD ALL THE FACIAL EXPRESSIONS!!!!!!

Last, but certainly not least, WHY IS THE CELL PHONE ALWAYS NEARLY DEAD?!?! I mean, come on. Be a little more creative.

Prime First Reads | Don't Make a Sound

Rating: ⭐

Aside from the ONE non-fiction title I have gotten from Amazon's First Reads, I have had really crappy luck so far. I go for the thrillers, because that is the genre I am most drawn to outside of my cozy giant non-fiction bubble. I love a good mystery/thriller that keeps me guessing, I don't need any of the romance BS, I just want a good story.

Unfortunately, this one was not a good one for me. Or for anyone. I definitely do not recommend it.

It started out really promising, and I was thinking that this could be a good series to get into it. Sawyer's life was interesting, as was her work as a reporter. But things spiraled downhill quickly when she had to return home to River Rock, the place she spent her childhood and where she was horrifically abused by her uncle and some guys he knew, while her parents turned a blind eye to it.

Everything about River Rock is a clusterfuck. The characters constantly talk about how the town is cursed, it damages people, it's evil, get out and stay out for good, blah blah blah. It was weird, like the town was its own living entity.

Except of course it wasn't. It was just one more attempt to make the story feel more sinister. The problem is, it did not work. It came across as super dramatic, not sinister.

The story is all over the place. There are so many random subplots going on, and things that were intended to be red herrings, but did not work that way. They were pretty half-assed in some places, truth be told.

While Sawyer is home, another teenage girl is killed in the same way that two other girls were when Sawyer was a child. Not to mention, her own best friend vanished without a trace. It was all just too much. So many of these plot points would have actually been decent stories on their own, instead of being thrown in one pot all together and stirred, just to see what would come out when it was done cooking.

We get Sawyer's point of view, then the point of view of a woman involved in a revenge/vigilante group (it is super obvious which of Sawyer's sisters was part of the group from very early on) and then when Sawyer is back in River Rock and the most recent murder occurs, we get this random point of view of the killer, who doesn't make an appearance until super late in the book. Prior to this though, far earlier, it was pretty obvious who the killer would be, though I have to admit I did not know how or why this person was involved. All it took was common sense to see that identity, but the whole rest of the plot regarding that involvement was an even bigger clusterfuck because it was all just so convoluted.

The main characters, mainly Sawyer and her sisters, were very underdeveloped. We get a lot of telling about them, but not nearly as much showing. One sister is super uptight, one is a hot mess. Sawyer is somewhere in the middle.

There is quite a bit of violence, and that did not bother me all that much, but it might very well bother others - mainly where the revenge group is concerned.

The pacing was awkward and slow and it was hard to stay interested. The only reason I kept going is because I had to see how right I was about all the nonsense. I was pretty accurate, if I do say so myself. But that is not really much to brag about, because this was also really predictable.

As you can see, this is a hard pass from me and I can not say I would recommend it to anyone. If you are still interested, it may still be available through Amazon First Reads. Praise Jesus for Prime, I am glad I did not pay money for this one.

Prime First Reads | The Club King: My Rise, Reign, and Fall in New York Nightlife

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

You can imagine my excitement when for the month of March, Amazon First Reads had a non-fiction title! Even though there were a couple fiction titles I was marginally interested in, I knew I had to snap this one up because it is about NYC and the Club Kid scene in the 80s and 90s. I knew Gatien's name but did not know much about him and boy, was this book a real roller coaster.

The book was kind of a slow start for me, only because Gatien detailed his early years growing up in a working-class town in Canada. It is not that this part is boring, and it certainly helped in shaping Gatien's life, but I wanted to hear about NYC. We'd get there eventually, but not without stops first in his hometown with his very first club. Then came Florida, Atlanta, New York, Chicago, and London. But it was in New York City that he truly shined, running multiple clubs and at work seven days a week to make sure everything was ready come opening. I almost get dizzy thinking about the sheer amount of work that went into planning each theme night, day after day after day. The behind-the-scenes look definitely gives me a greater appreciation for the bars and clubs I frequented in college. Though obviously not on the scale of a NYC club, there was certainly much work to be done during the day to prepare for the doors opening that night.

Though Gatien had clubs in all the cities mentioned above, it was his four in New York City that truly made him into the ruler of nightlife. He would not have gotten where he did had he not opened his first club while still in his hometown, and each club along the way helped Gatien gain the experience and confidence he needed in order to be successful on the big stage. At his peak, Gatien was operating four clubs - Club USA, Limelight, Palladium, and Tunnel - simultaneously. He employed a staff that ran like a well-oiled machine and that is what made him so successful for so long. They were professionals who took their jobs seriously and did what they were paid to do. That does not mean they didn't screw up, but they were a family and they took care of one another.

It was truly astonishing to me to read about all the musical acts who appeared in Gatien's clubs over the years before his fall. Jay-Z, Biggie, 50 Cent, and so many more that it would take forever to list them all. And it was not only future hip-hop stars and icons who regularly took to the stage, but musical acts from all genres - grunge, techno, rock, and of course house. Gatien and his team made his clubs The Place to be, and this was also done in no small part thanks to the Club Kids who thrived in the spotlight, enjoying every moment of terrifying suburban housewives being interviewed by Phil Donohue.

All good things must come to an end though, and end they would. As the district attorney, Rudy Giuliani made it his personal mission it seems to completely bring down and destroy Gatien's livelihood. Naturally there are two sides to every story and we can only trust that all parties are telling the truth. When there is discrepancies and contradictions, someone is lying. They may not know they are lying, but they are nonetheless. Keeping the weapons out of his clubs was obviously a lot easier than the drugs, but I would have challenged Guiliani to find ANY club in that era where there was zero drug use. It would have been impossible, because no club like that existed. There are so many conflicting stories and Gatien maintains he was not selling drugs or hiring dealers to sell in his clubs. Others who were there at the time say otherwise. The claim that Gatien was pushing the sales seems like a bit of a stretch because he was already making so much money. On the other hand, it is super easy to always want more money and providing drugs right there in the club was a good way to get it. Instead of cleaning up the streets and going after the dealers literally standing on the street corners and in the parks, Giuliani's singular focus is on Gatien, which in itself is highly suspect. It was almost as if it was personal. Even so, I have a hard time believing Gatien was nearly so innocent as he claims and there is likely truth to both sides of the story. Unrelated: never forget that Rudy Giuliani is a despicable human being and bat-shit crazy.

Gatien is the first to admit that some of his success had to do with the sheer luck of being in the right place at the right time. But even so, he was a born hustler who worked his ass off to climb higher and higher, to create the Next Big Thing. Also on display is his business acumen, and the amount of attention he paid to detail in order to keep things fresh and new in each of his clubs. He was involved in every aspect of the club, from the designs to the construction, choosing the right sound and light systems, the perfect artwork, the locations of the bars, and more. Gatien did not rely on the same gimmick for each place, and when he finally sold off his interests in all other clubs, sticking only to his New York playground, this is even more obvious. Gatien was willing to gamble and take chances that others might not have been, and it paid off in spades. He found unique buildings for his clubs to call home and that in itself was huge - abandoned buildings that served other purposes before became the places to be on any given night where the music pounded and the alcohol flowed. He also made some very astute observations early on that served him well over his a career - number one being that hiring a DJ to spin the music would cost far less than band fees. Another facet of the story I found especially interesting was that of how Gatien realized he could welcome the crowds that typically enjoyed hip-hop and rap, while also keeping the clubs free from violence. In that time, many clubs would not play this music because of the men and as a result, the violence that came with the male-dominated crowds. Gatien figured out that if he were to let women into the club for free throughout the early evening, and he put a limit on the amount of men let in at a time, then he could make bank on these hip-hop/rap nights while keeping everyone relatively safe. It definitely helped that Gatien employed great security teams, and patrons were searched before entering the clubs.

While I have few complaints about the book, there is one that has bothered me quite a bit. I can push aside the glossing-over of Gatien's surface-scratching-only drug-use that he managed to control for the most part, and even ignore the repetition of him needing to find the next big thing, getting restless whenever he achieved a new level of success. I can not though, overlook the relatively little space given to the Club Kids in general who made New York City nightlife into what it was. He does discuss Michael Alig and the murder of Andre "Angel" Melendez; it is interesting that he is very quick to distance himself from Melendez and say he was not welcome at any of Gatien's clubs. While doing so, he does maintain he worked with Alig for quite some time. It is interesting to note all the discrepancies related to the murder of Melendez. Some of those discrepancies have come from Alig and his roommate Robert Riggs. The stories range from Melendez being killed in self-defense by Riggs when he attacked Alig in an argument over a debt, to Riggs killing Melendez for Gatien because Gatien was under investigation for the rampant drug-use in his clubs. We will never know the whole story and I certainly did not expect it to be covered in-depth here. But I did expect much more about the Club Kids, the larger-than-life personalities who brought bodies back to the clubs after the initial scare of the AIDS crisis, when young men were dying at alarming rates and people were terrified to go out. It is quite flummoxing to me that a book about Peter Gatien and his clubs would not include significant amount of attention given to the scene at the time. They helped MAKE his clubs into the hot spots they became.

Gatien discusses at length the case built against him. It all really began when a teenager from New Jersey killed himself and club life was blamed for his tragic choice. From that moment, Gatien's days as the king of NY nightlife were numbered. He also discusses informants working against him, and does his best to discredit all of them, which he is pretty successful at. It became Giuliani's obsession, to bring Gatien down. The Feds were willing to pay many who themselves were still dealing drugs, breaking the laws themselves, in order to get Gatien. Lots of shady stuff all around going on, but I will leave that for you to discover. While Gatien was not found guilty of drug charges, he was charged and plead guilty to tax evasion. For that, he was deported back to Canada, unable to stay in the country he loved so desperately.

Overall, I really enjoyed this read. It is not without its problems, but the vicarious experience of club life in the 80s and 90s is worth the time. Here are a couple quotes I really liked, or had an impact on me as I read.

"The week after Biggie Smalls died at the tender age of twenty-four, Flex cued up 'Hypnotize,' and I watched as three thousand people in the club chanted along or silently wept. That night of mourning deepened the bonds of the community, getting beyond neighborhood rivalries or the East-Coast-vs.-West-Coats rap wars. The heartrending scene epitomized Tunnel Sundays for me. By design or by accident, we had managed to generate a real sense of kinship, an impression that everyone present was part of something great" (67%).

"I could have survived sleeping on a concrete shelf for a bed and eating shitty prison food. I could have faced being pummeled by repeated legal proceedings. But getting exiled from the land that I loved killed a part of my soul" (98%).

"A blackened shroud, a hand-me-down gown of rags and silk, a costume fit for one who sits and cries for all tomorrow's parties...Like Lou Reed and Nico, I'm feeling elegiac for all the good times that will never be. They won't come around like they did in the golden age. I was there, and if you were there, too, you know the truth. Those were the days when the party never ended, and it was goddamn fabulous" (99%).

Highly recommended.

Prime First Reads | The Silence

Rating: ⭐⭐

I chose this book as my Amazon Prime First Reads for Feb.

Usually I love an unreliable narrator, but this one was not done very well. It was really hard to get into the story - Stella is a former child star who has grown up, is out of the spotlight, and life is truthfully just kind of shitty. Her parents are dead, and her one-night-stand-turned-boyfriend is slowly but surely isolating Stella from her friends while simultaneously gas-lighting the shit out of her.

There were tons of clues about who Marco was and it was pretty clear he was the bad guy. The first sign was the insane amount of pills he was giving Stella, so she could 'sleep'. I skimmed a lot in the beginning because none of the characters were particularly interesting or likable and I wanted to get to the meat of the story and see how it would play out. Once Stella is isolated, alone in the cottage with no friends, little contact with the family she has left, and basically only Marco to talk to when he visits from London, things get interesting. Even so, I kept thinking there was going to be some plot twist, something I did not see, because otherwise everything was so painfully obvious there was almost no point. Sadly, there was no twist and everything went down generally how I imagined it would - I really liked the paranormal element and it was greatly appreciated, but like every other aspect of the novel, nothing quite gelled together in the end.

This book had so much potential and the plot was certainly intriguing, but the execution did not cut it. Stella was such an idiot sometimes, always believing everything Marco was telling her and ignoring what her friends were saying. She was so miserable before she met him, and even though he was acting like her 'savior', she was still super miserable anyway. That's a pretty good indicator that the relationship is not a healthy one, and yet...

If you still feel the need to read this one, I recommend checking it out from the library or snagging it as a First Reads.

Mini Reviews | Minka Kent

I had such high hopes for this author after seeing some really positive reviews. I know that I am not a typical fiction/thriller reader, but I am branching out and finding some new authors and genres. I was so incredibly disappointed with both of these, it was almost enough to send me back down by non-fiction rabbit hole and wait not-so-patiently for Karen McManus to release The Cousins in the fall, and then give me more Nate in what I hope will be a third book in the One of Us Is Lying series. (Please, PLEASE, another book! I have to have more Nate and Bronwyn!!! PLEASE!!!)

Anyway. On to the books which were not great, and a waste of time I will never get back.

 ⭐⭐

Well, it could have been worse. I am glad I did not pay money for this and got it as my January First Reads from Amazon.

In the end, the book was super predictable and tried so hard to be something it's not - a real thriller. it ends up being nothing more than a dude with a grudge, some identify theft, and a completely ridiculous requirement of suspension of belief.

If you are planning to read the book, skip this part, because there will be some spoilers.

So this dumb-dumb Brienne was attacked one night leaving work and since then has been unable to live alone in this giant house that she inherited from her grandparents. Strange things start happening that make her question her sanity as her male roommate slowly starts to reveal more and more information about who she "truly" is (except isn't). There is the first major plot hole, RIGHT THERE. See, her roommate is pretending to be her husband to convince her she is someone else entirely. EXCEPT the event that kicked off everything in the first place was the mailing of an apartment key to Brienne, WHICH SHE NEVER WOULD HAVE RECEIVED IF SHE WAS NOT ACTUALLY BRIENNE! I mean, seriously.

The whole time I am sitting there reading, thinking this idiot truly will get herself killed because she is not going to the police, and has all these excuses why not and blah blah and FFS, you are living with someone who wants to kill you. She doesn't figure that out right away of course, but anyone with half a brain reading this will see it pretty quickly. And if I am doubting who I am, and being told I am someone I don't remember being, then you can bet your ass I am talking to the police ASAP, considering the fact that they would without a doubt know who you are based on the investigation into your previous attack that lead to this fucked up situation in the first place with you not being able to live alone. Ugh.

The whole body double situation was also really ridiculous, because how on earth did his girlfriend just happen to look enough like Brienne to try to pull this shit off? It makes no sense. None of it does.

The only reason I kept reading is because all that time I thought surely I was wrong, the twist could not be that obvious, it was a red herring. Nope. Sure wasn't. I was hoping for some redemption here but there was none.

Hard pass on this one.

 ⭐

What. The. Hell.

I was so hoping that When I Was You was a fluke, and this one would be better. After all, the ratings and reviews looked a lot better and it seemed like a much more interesting story-line.

There are drastically different plots running side by side and early on I had an inkling of how they might be connected, but was not totally sure. When Nic started 'discovering' things about her husband and her mind raced off to the worst possible option for the given situation, it was plausible to me. Here is this couple, unable to have children, world-travelers living in our very modern age, contrasted with two young women left alone in a cabin, deep in the woods who have had no contact with the outside world. It's clear that at some point, their stories will converge and I had some ideas on how this would happen.

ANY OF THOSE IDEAS WOULD HAVE BEEN WAY BETTER THAN WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED.

The story was solidly trucking along and I was thinking this could be a three or four star read. Then the many ideas I had for where it could be going were slowly peeled away as it became clear that none of my ideas would fit within the narrative as we learned new information, so I was even more anxious to get to the twist because it just had to be delicious.

Well, guess what?

IT WASN'T.

It was again simply too unbelievable. You would have to complete disconnect from reality in order to make this seem remotely plausible. Even worse than When I Was You. I have not been so let down by a book in a really long time, not counting the one up there that more so left me just thinking, "Why the hell was this nonsense even written?"

It kills me, because up until the reveal, things were great. I was genuinely captivated by the book, wondering how all the pieces would fit. I unfortunately discovered that not only do the pieces not fit, but they are obviously mixed in with pieces from some other book where they might actually make sense, and we only have half of them to begin with.

After these two duds, Minka Kent is an author I will not longer be reading.