Reviews - True Crime | The StoryGraph

420 reviews for:

True Crime

Samantha Kolesnik

3.53 AVERAGE

toadgirlreads's review against another edition

3.5

challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

queergoth_reads's review against another edition

3.75

dark emotional sad fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

leahrosereads's review against another edition

4.25

dark tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Started October with this absolutely disturbing piece of work! I was horrified from start to finish, which as a horror fan, I thoroughly enjoyed. Though, nothing about these characters' journeys were particularly enjoyable. True Crime is a dark piece of fiction with fantastic storytelling and monsters on every page.

Highly recommend if you have the stomach for it!

Content Warnings

littlelightgirl's review against another edition

3.0

dark tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Diverse cast of characters: No

philomathean's review against another edition

2.0

challenging dark sad tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Content Warnings

hskurat's review against another edition

3.5

dark reflective sad fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

weathersreadsgarbage's review against another edition

5.0

challenging dark fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I didn’t find this as shocking or disturbing as people hyped it up to be, but I’m not taking marks off for that. I’m hard to shock and harder to disturb. It’s not the author’s fault.

What I’m impressed by is the fact that this is written in a way that shows that the author is intelligent and purposeful in what she’s writing. So often these “disturbing” books are written by men with one hand on the keyboard and one hand furiously jerking off. It shows. The shocking bits are put in cheaply to up the ante and there’s no emotion.

In True Crime though we have cause and effect. There’s elements that will make you uncomfortable, but they’re placed thoughtfully. The sexual violence isn’t written as cheap erotica for some stupid fucking man to get his kicks. The lasting effects of sexual abuse are very really here. Suzy feels very real. There’s a film between Suzy and the rest of the world that will resonate if you grew up with severe childhood trauma.

While I was left wishing Suzy had made different choices and also wanting another hundred pages or so I think that’s kind of a good thing in a novella. This moved quickly enough to make me feel something but never overstayed it’s welcome.