Reviews with content warning for Panic attacks/disorders - Truly Devious

Reviews tagging 'Panic attacks/disorders'

Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson

140 reviews

david_slack110507's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I will admit that I would have most likely gotten this finished a lot earlier if I hadn't gotten distracted with other books and other things happening in life as I left the book with about 40ish pages left for a while whilst finishing other books and doing other things in life.

The biggest strength of the book is that it is fast-paced, I got through most of the book very quickly and the condensed chapter length helped with this as they didn't drag on for too long. Another highlight of the book is that the dual timelines work very well with me sometimes preferring the past timeline over the present Ellingham one, but both were interesting, and their associated mysteries were good as well though in that regard I would say that the Truly Devious plotline from the past was a much more interesting mystery than the one in the present regarding the murder of Hayes.

My biggest issue with the book is that I found it very difficult to connect with the characters as with regards to the past timeline, the story is told factually that sometimes has some character moments that help develop the cast of characters for that timeline, but this doesn't happen often. The cast of characters for the present timeline wasn't also the easiest to connect as very few characters stood out to me apart from Nate and Stevie who I think had the most distinctive personalities/characters though I would be interested in seeing them develop, I just found that it was quite overwhelming with the number of characters introduced and then often left for extended periods of time before being reintroduced into the story.

The second half and near the end is definitely the strongest part of the book and I am very interested in seeing where both the Truly Devious and Hayes' murder throughout the series. I do hope that the series doesn't drag out the mystery, but I have a feeling that it will reach a satisfying conclusion. I would give this a 4 but I feel like a 3.5-star rating is much more appropriate as my main issues such as the lack of connectivity as well as Stevie and David's relationship kind of came out of nowhere. I feel like my experience with this book would have been much better if I had read it more consistently, so this is a fault on my part.

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luxxltyd's review against another edition

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tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.5

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bee87's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious sad tense slow-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

4.25

Would’ve been five stars but….CLIFFHANGER?!!!!!!!

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liesthemoontells's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

I found this book very slow in its pacing and wasn't a fan of the sharp cuts back and forth from the 1930s to the present, I felt that there wasn't enough done in the modern day plot to justify linking it back to the past.

I found the main character Stevie pretty insufferable, which wouldn't have been such an issue if any of the other characters were well-rounded and likeable.

As the book was a quick read and ended on a cliffhanger (and I already downloaded the sequels) I will keep reading, hopefully the pacing and characters evolve from here.

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thebookpaiges's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

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jamespotterluv's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

YALL this was mad. im so ANNOEYDSAUI like bro. i cant even spoil it for yall bc by the end half the plot twists aint even solved. like cmon. im lowkey addicted to this series. i need to finish it bc what. so there's quite a few plot twists and there's one right at the end, y'all know which one i mean. i guessed most of the plot twists im not gonna lie, most were predictable buT I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING LIEK WHAT. crazy. the writing was sanist a few times. it felt like diverse characters were j included for it to be diverse. like, a sentence was made abt them, maybe about like their pronouns or smth and that was it. u got one sentence. if ur gonna represent someone do it right! like, the author misgendered her own character. bfr. i felt like the author kinda rushed the ending? i mean, great ending, don't get me wrong. this was a medium paced book up until chapter 26. after that i was like "more is happening in these last chapters than the 26 chapters before it" like sm was happening n it was hard to keep track of who did what.

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bzliz's review against another edition

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adventurous funny mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

This is an easy read for any YA mystery lovers and unlike many YA mysteries I’ve read

no mysteries get solved! Clues are constantly missed by police but always found by our teenage detective Stevie. Crime scene investigation takes approximately an hour or two in this world and virtually no evidence is taken by police which is pretty convenient for Stevie. She also somehow avoids getting in actual real trouble for putting her fingerprints all over actual clues (which she doesn’t appear to hand over to investigators anyway) and for tampering with crime scenes.

The romance between Stevie and David came out of nowhere for me. I do enjoy the importance Stevie places on trying to maintain her friendship with Janelle and it would be an easy step to say Stevie is autistic-coded, though it is unclear if that was intentional.

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