Reviews

Win Lose Kill Die by Cynthia Murphy

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th3list3n3r's review

adventurous challenging dark funny mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

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

3.0

The twist was easy to guess. I pinpointed the killer very early on but it was still very interesting to see how we got to that point. The only issue I had was that these were supposed to be the “best and brightest” at their chosen subjects but weren’t shown that for most of the characters. For example, the girl interested in Psychology is considered extremely knowledgeable based on knowing the triad for serial killers and who Charles Manson is.

noor_ahmed's review

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3.0

I loved this book so much like literally it had me on the edge of my seat the last 100 pages or something. I loved the killer blurbs in between as they were fire. I honestly didn't think I'd enjoy this book this much when I was first reading bcz the first 40 pages or smt were kinda boring. HOWEVER after that I was super interested and from page about 120 to the last page(308)

I COULDN'T PUT THE BOOK DOWN. I WAS JUST LIKE WHO COULD IT BE AND TO A MOMENT I THOUGHT OH OK WE ALREADY KNOW ITS THAT PERSON BUT BROOO I WAS SHOCKED BY THE ENDING.

I devoured the last 100 or something pages and I loved the investigating vibes.
If u like a good girls guide to murder, I believe u might like this one 2
Would 100% recommend

kennnnnnna's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
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

2.5

I knew who was responsible within the first 10 pages which is not a good thing, there were a lot of loose ends that were never cleared up, a lot of the story building just seemed contradictory and/or never explained? like they're in high school, but then during thetesting of the inhaler she thinks back to her "high school science" you mean like last year? and if you're not a science person like Liz claims, then how do you know how to poison an inhaler, and use eye drops to give you a stomach ache but not kill you? how was this like 17yo girl paying off so many police officers like how much money are you supposed to have when you so desperately need a college scholarship and your parents don't care about you? where did the money come from? you're telling me that no one texted their parents on their little burner phones at any point during all of this and no parent wanted them pulled from this school? even with the unexplained payoffs, 6 murders or mysterious accidents would be investigated at least a LITTLE BIT and it's not like she covered her tracks all that well, fingerprints and evidence all over the place, and the assumption that Taylor was gonna get sepsis and almost die seemed a little too big of an assumption for me, I know she's an unreliable narrator blah, blah, but it seemed too far fetched for most of the story, also Patel robbing the place? Seemed like a throw away plot contrivance to set up the ending, and all that late info about Marcu 's kid and Taylor's dad in jail? Lead to nothing (also using billy loomis as a character name seemed dumb to me)

kindadopish's review

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mysterious medium-paced

3.75

catiass17's review

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dark mysterious medium-paced

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

4.0

i liked it. i kind of knew of the big twist of the book. but lets. say the biggest twist was kind of easy to guess. i wasnt 100% sure but the twist was always in the back of my head. 4⭐️

liisu7's review

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

seekerxr's review

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dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

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

3.5

Ok so, did I enjoy myself? Yeah, I did. This book was an extremely quick read; I blasted through it in about 3-4 hours I think, and the short chapters definitely help with that. It kept the tension high throughout pretty much the entire story, so it was kinda impossible to stop reading at all. I was entertained throughout the whole thing, no matter what my opinions are on the choices the author made.

I could've gone without all the pop-culture references since I feel like they added a level of cheesiness the book really didn't need. I think they were included to play up the whole teenager aspect (since this book is YA) but we could've gone without it with no effect on the story.

Now, as for my gripes with the story. This is all gonna be spoilers.

In the final confrontation with Dr. Patel, I think she was written way too juvenile for how old she was. No adult talks the way she talks; the author transferred over the way the teenagers we speaking to this adult woman and she started coming off as a cartoon villain.

In regards to the whodunit, I don't like that it was Liz. I especially don't like that the main reason she did is because 'she was crazy!!11!!'. I think that's a tired motivation that's been overused so many times it just doesn't work anymore. Yes, part of her motivation was that she wanted to be Head Girl because she had her own ambitions, but I would've liked it better if they leaned into that rather than 'ooo she's not right in the head!'

There was also absolutely no indicators or little clues that Liz was the murderer throughout the entire book. I understand wanting to keep the twist a surprise but with this kind of plot device you need to do SOME sort of foreshadowing for it to be truly effective. To think Liz is good the entire book only to plot dump in one of the final chapters and having a quick villain reveal just leaves your readers going "...ok?". It takes away almost all of the impact.

Overall I had a good time reading this but there were a lot of things it could've done better.