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3.31 AVERAGE
3.31 AVERAGE
2.5☆
"Darkness lives in women too-despite the world's refusal to see it."
Florence, aka Florida, portrays herself as the innocent prisoner, stating she doesn't belong in prison. Her ex-cellmate, Dios, is convinced Florida is lying and is determined to make Florida confess. Due to the covid pandemic, both women are released from prison, and now Dios' determination has turned into an unhealthy obsession.
The narrative is shared from the perspective of four different women: Dios, Florida, Kase, and Detective Lobos.
Dios, though a key character in the plot, doesn't really have any direct role in the narrative. Not only do I feel the story would have benefited from Dios' insight, but the obsession Dios had with Florida would have felt more convincing. Due to the lack of Dios' perspective, the overall cat-and-mouse pursuit between the two women felt pointless and unrealistic. I personally would have enjoyed diving deeper into Dios' chaotic mind and past.
Through flashbacks, we get to learn more about Florida, and the author does a great job giving us a glimpse into her thoughts. However, Florida is consistently battling with herself on who she is and what she wants to the point that I felt I just couldn't connect with the character and didn't care what happened to her.
Kase is another inmate alongside Dios and Florida, and her character shares her unique perspective on the psyche of women. Her narration, though confusing at times, helps give information lacking from Florida's story, but otherwise, it takes away from the main plot.
Detective Lobos was my favorite of the 4 women, and we get to see her deal with violence in her marriage as well as discrimination in her workplace. Her story was very interesting, and I enjoyed the parts during her POV, but it also felt like it wasn't needed and was unrelated to the main plot.
I did want to find out what happened to the characters; however, I never felt invested in any of them, and this created a disconnect that made it hard to finish the book.
I did enjoy the depiction of the pandemic and the glimpse of the effect the pandemic had on the homeless, inmates, and daily routines. Travel bans, social distancing, plastic barriers, and people being afraid of coughing had me laughing and transported right back to that time.
I went into this book not knowing anything about it, and though I enjoyed the author's writing style, the overall plot was muddy and felt very slow, especially in the first half. I also wouldn't classify this as a Western or Thriller; it is more of a literary crime drama.
"Darkness lives in women too-despite the world's refusal to see it."
Florence, aka Florida, portrays herself as the innocent prisoner, stating she doesn't belong in prison. Her ex-cellmate, Dios, is convinced Florida is lying and is determined to make Florida confess. Due to the covid pandemic, both women are released from prison, and now Dios' determination has turned into an unhealthy obsession.
The narrative is shared from the perspective of four different women: Dios, Florida, Kase, and Detective Lobos.
Dios, though a key character in the plot, doesn't really have any direct role in the narrative. Not only do I feel the story would have benefited from Dios' insight, but the obsession Dios had with Florida would have felt more convincing. Due to the lack of Dios' perspective, the overall cat-and-mouse pursuit between the two women felt pointless and unrealistic. I personally would have enjoyed diving deeper into Dios' chaotic mind and past.
Through flashbacks, we get to learn more about Florida, and the author does a great job giving us a glimpse into her thoughts. However, Florida is consistently battling with herself on who she is and what she wants to the point that I felt I just couldn't connect with the character and didn't care what happened to her.
Kase is another inmate alongside Dios and Florida, and her character shares her unique perspective on the psyche of women. Her narration, though confusing at times, helps give information lacking from Florida's story, but otherwise, it takes away from the main plot.
Detective Lobos was my favorite of the 4 women, and we get to see her deal with violence in her marriage as well as discrimination in her workplace. Her story was very interesting, and I enjoyed the parts during her POV, but it also felt like it wasn't needed and was unrelated to the main plot.
I did want to find out what happened to the characters; however, I never felt invested in any of them, and this created a disconnect that made it hard to finish the book.
I did enjoy the depiction of the pandemic and the glimpse of the effect the pandemic had on the homeless, inmates, and daily routines. Travel bans, social distancing, plastic barriers, and people being afraid of coughing had me laughing and transported right back to that time.
I went into this book not knowing anything about it, and though I enjoyed the author's writing style, the overall plot was muddy and felt very slow, especially in the first half. I also wouldn't classify this as a Western or Thriller; it is more of a literary crime drama.
This is a pandemic novel. I thought, somewhat foolish maybe, that I would be okay with reading one now. It's 2023, we are dealing with it by getting COVID vaccines and boosting them (GET YOUR SHOTS), and I was like "I can be a mental headspace for this novel".
Boy was I WRONG.
Now, you're thinking, oh, this is something against the author. This is something against the type of novel. Nope. Wrong. All wrong. This is 100% on me not being able to read a pandemic novel. Plus, it makes me so angry that I can't because there's so much good in it. From the little I read until I couldn't anymore, there's good. I highly recommend it if you are unlike me and can get through such a novel. I just - I couldn't. It wasn't even the setting - a women's prison - or the characters. It was the pandemic part of the setting and I am so sorry that I had to put this down. We'll give it another try in a few years.
Boy was I WRONG.
Now, you're thinking, oh, this is something against the author. This is something against the type of novel. Nope. Wrong. All wrong. This is 100% on me not being able to read a pandemic novel. Plus, it makes me so angry that I can't because there's so much good in it. From the little I read until I couldn't anymore, there's good. I highly recommend it if you are unlike me and can get through such a novel. I just - I couldn't. It wasn't even the setting - a women's prison - or the characters. It was the pandemic part of the setting and I am so sorry that I had to put this down. We'll give it another try in a few years.
I’m already a fan of Ivy Pochoda, who writes gritty LA noir type novels about women and how they move and carry themselves in an unforgiving city (see: These Women). This was another hit for me: a meditation on female rage, told through the cat and mouse story of two recently released prison inmates, Florida and Diosmary.
Pochoda’s Florida is a richly drawn character, a woman grappling with the reality of who she is while knowing she presents as the embodiment of growing up in LA’s privileged class. It would have been easy to write Florida as a Piper Kerman-type, but Pochoda instead uses Florida as a way to look past just the inflection points that change someone’s life, in favor of reading the clues of who they always have been; clues that had been hiding in plain sight all along. She goes deep on Florida grappling with understanding who she’s become compared to who she always was, and the revelations Florida came to didn’t seem standard or forced.
My only flag was that I was left wanting a little more about Diosmary’s backstory, though I do think that Pochoda was purposely spare in her prose about Dios, specifically to illustrate something else she brings up in the novel: that sometimes people just are who they are, no matter how little or how much we know about them.
I enjoyed this read and will continue to read more of Pochoda’s books on difficult women.
Pochoda’s Florida is a richly drawn character, a woman grappling with the reality of who she is while knowing she presents as the embodiment of growing up in LA’s privileged class. It would have been easy to write Florida as a Piper Kerman-type, but Pochoda instead uses Florida as a way to look past just the inflection points that change someone’s life, in favor of reading the clues of who they always have been; clues that had been hiding in plain sight all along. She goes deep on Florida grappling with understanding who she’s become compared to who she always was, and the revelations Florida came to didn’t seem standard or forced.
My only flag was that I was left wanting a little more about Diosmary’s backstory, though I do think that Pochoda was purposely spare in her prose about Dios, specifically to illustrate something else she brings up in the novel: that sometimes people just are who they are, no matter how little or how much we know about them.
I enjoyed this read and will continue to read more of Pochoda’s books on difficult women.
I couldn’t get to the end of this book fast enough. Completely pointless story with uninteresting characters. Do not recommend.
This was great. Very easy to read and I loved the multiple POVs. The psychological aspect of this novel really hits you as a reader as well. I really enjoyed this!!
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I have entirely mixed feelings on this book. I really don't like violent action based books. But I love character driven books. This was both. However, this was a unique character driven book, entirely lacking motivational causes for the main characters' actions. All of it is a mystery. Why Dios is after Florida to make her into what she thinks she is is unclear. With the exception of classism. Dios was a charity case for mucky mucks of upper-class guilt driven funding. Florida was the daughter of those mucky mucks. Was she trying to turn her into what she wasn't?
Florida had major issues with her parents, but they were not really spelled out for the reader. Right girl feeling ignored? Rich girl feeling like she was pushed into mature situations far earlier than ready? This was a make up your own theory kinda vibe. But we found out the most about her.
Lobos was a domestic violence survivor and had issues of her own to work through.
That all being said, none of these characters' actions were explained. This was a narrative demonstration of their anger and rage and undealt with hurt. This is the theme and is mostly reiterated by Lobos' internal soliloquy. Women hold rage, and more often than not, it remains internalized. All of the violence perpetrated is equally implemented on women from Dios' side and men from Florida. There is one exception from each. There is only one explained murder and that is Florida's exception. And to be honest, Dios is such a mystery that I thought the author was going to present her at the end as an internal voice egging Florida on to violence. But that was not the case. The ending was unexpected but lacking in my opinion for a true black and white ending. The whole story was so unexplained and lacking motivation that I thought the ending would be a clear wrap-up to explain all the characters. I was wrong. Hence, why I am feeling mixed emotions here.
As a long-time reader, I know the author owes us nothing as a reader. But I feel if you are going to give us a third-person character driven story, at least give us an explanation. I feel disappointed but also still trying to figure out the puzzle. The fact that I'm still thinking about it is why I gave it 3 stars.
Florida had major issues with her parents, but they were not really spelled out for the reader. Right girl feeling ignored? Rich girl feeling like she was pushed into mature situations far earlier than ready? This was a make up your own theory kinda vibe. But we found out the most about her.
Lobos was a domestic violence survivor and had issues of her own to work through.
That all being said, none of these characters' actions were explained. This was a narrative demonstration of their anger and rage and undealt with hurt. This is the theme and is mostly reiterated by Lobos' internal soliloquy. Women hold rage, and more often than not, it remains internalized. All of the violence perpetrated is equally implemented on women from Dios' side and men from Florida. There is one exception from each. There is only one explained murder and that is Florida's exception. And to be honest, Dios is such a mystery that I thought the author was going to present her at the end as an internal voice egging Florida on to violence. But that was not the case. The ending was unexpected but lacking in my opinion for a true black and white ending. The whole story was so unexplained and lacking motivation that I thought the ending would be a clear wrap-up to explain all the characters. I was wrong. Hence, why I am feeling mixed emotions here.
As a long-time reader, I know the author owes us nothing as a reader. But I feel if you are going to give us a third-person character driven story, at least give us an explanation. I feel disappointed but also still trying to figure out the puzzle. The fact that I'm still thinking about it is why I gave it 3 stars.
Listened to audiobook, 3.5 stars. Lots of “Ooh, I want to know what happens next,” that lead to, “Oh, that’s it?”
I'm not sure I can finish this one. We'll see...
Either it got less violent or I got desensitized. I finished it, anyway.
Rough. Sometimes annoying.
Either it got less violent or I got desensitized. I finished it, anyway.
Rough. Sometimes annoying.