Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
emotional
inspiring
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Definitely a Mary Sue type of book. The author pretty much writes with the same theme. No big character development or story development. I didn’t enjoy at all and wanted to just get the book over with.
But there are some really good quotable lines throughout the book.
But there are some really good quotable lines throughout the book.
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Really tried to power through this one but am calling it quits close to 50% rather than leaving a super low star rating.
Pros: Obuobi is a great writer at the line level. I think this is why I am so frustrated. Like seriously, so many newbie romance authors can’t string a coherent sentence together. Obuori is TALENTED. Despite my grievances, I’m gonna try again.
Cons:
Pros: Obuobi is a great writer at the line level. I think this is why I am so frustrated. Like seriously, so many newbie romance authors can’t string a coherent sentence together. Obuori is TALENTED. Despite my grievances, I’m gonna try again.
Cons:
- No yearning, no tension. I think one of the traps of writing emotionally aware characters who are in therapy is the over intellectualization of emotions. It’s a specific flavor of telling vs showing that’s hard to describe. The TL;DR is that it's usually boring and makes me think- why am I even here reading about these people? I think Jessica Joyce gets it right in The Ex Vows but many, many authors seem to be getting it wrong. Depression and avoidance are also really difficult to write well, I say as a depressed avoidant person. There’s a lot of running away and stonewalling. It’s hard to move the plot forward with that. It can feel frustrating in a manufactured way. Example: Jo and Mal's relationship progresses; PSYCH! she ghosts him because ~depression~ and ~abusive mother & sad backstory~ and ~burnout n stuff~. That felt like a move purely done for plot convenience. It felt inauthentic and like I was being jerked around as a reader. Please don't do this.
- Asking us to root for influencers. Seriously. I could write a book about this. Jo had no clear brand identity (hawking IUDs and couture dresses, huh?). Her brand was ~vibes~ and suspension of disbelief. I struggled. Especially thinking of influencers IRL, and how some of the most harmful ones are the folks selling snake oil backed by the letters MD. Jo told us she had ethics. Operative word here is TOLD. I never had enough to fully buy into this. This is where as a reader I can't help but layer my own experience. I had a really really hard time rooting for someone whose job is to make sure I remain a good consumer while this character simultaneously thinks about how soulless what she's doing is because she's "above" that - zero recognition of the harm she may be putting out in the world.
- Jo was incredibly hard to root for. Readers don’t have a problem rooting for “unlikable” women, we have a problem rooting for characters we don’t understand. Characters are not people and they can’t, by design, have the full emotional range and inconsistency of human beings. Jo was inconsistent, wishy-washy, and confusing. She is so hyper independent I kept wondering why she even needed a man??? She needed to get away from Ezra, and that didn't necessitate running into another man's arms.
- Mal’s perspective sometimes just seemed like it was there to tell us, ad nauseum, how amazing Jo was. He was somehow a doormat and also love-bombing her. Saying ILY so quickly? Okay, Ted Mosby.
- I don’t think they belonged together. The thing about golden retrievers x black cats dynamic is that the black cat has gotta protect their golden at all costs. At some point, they have to be all-in. There was no foreshadowing or signposting up to the 50% mark that Jo was gonna flip this switch and become a Mal stan. Jo was only looking out for Jo. At what point was she gonna start to have similar feelings for Mal? I just felt like what she liked about Mal was his attention and attraction to her, that anyone could have been nice to her this way and she would have felt the same. It aint a romance if the simping is unliteral. Jo felt like she should have been Mal’s fellow creative friend, offering plutonic career support.
- Ezra - why was this storyline even in here? It needed to be more or less. As it was, it was an annoying subplot I wanted to swat away like a mosquito.
I did not care enough about these characters. The FP was great, but I don’t want to read about influencers. I just didn’t care about this love triangle.
emotional
hopeful
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
funny
hopeful
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes