Reviews - A Sea of Unspoken Things

2.61k reviews for:

A Sea of Unspoken Things

Adrienne Young

3.78 AVERAGE

katelynh13's review

3.25

slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

jademlav's review against another edition

4.0

mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: N/A

Flaws of characters a main focus: N/A

florazka's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH: 0%

Boring

chkrato's review

3.0

emotional mysterious sad slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

corinnap's review against another edition

3.0

3.5 - I liked this book, but did not think it offered anything that stood out to me on any front. The mystery was OK, the romance was OK, the characters were OK. But, I still enjoyed it overall. In the beginning of the book, while the FMC is on her way to the town where the story will take place, I felt all the vibes - it felt very atmospheric to me and the forests felt like its own character. That quickly disappeared for me and the rest of the story took place inside except for one other scene which I enjoyed reading. I wish the 'atmosphere' had stood on its own in this book. I feel like it did in The Unmaking of June Farrow. I will say though that my friend had a very different experience and loved the setting so much so take my review with a grain of salt. I also predicted two very small parts of the plot twist which does not take away from my rating in this case.

I did not know this but it looks like Adrienne Young branches out and writes a variety of stories and genres. I read the Unmaking of June Farrow and despite a few small technical things that bothered me, I LOVED IT. I was expecting more of the same with this one and was disappointed. She also wrote Fable which if I am not mistaken is a pirate story, while The Spells of Unforgetting is a witchy story. I respect an author for doing this. Hopefully she will find her niche and focus more on that but totally appreciate her trying many different things. We don't see that very often.

Thank you Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group for providing me with an ARC of this book. My opinions are my own.

otter5000's review against another edition

3.5

slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

abmalada's review

3.75

emotional mysterious reflective slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This one was a little disappointing to me because I typically love Adrienne Young’s books and this fell a little flat for me. A Sea of Unspoken Things is less magical and more reflective than The Unmaking of June Farrow and Spells for Forgetting. The premise is that James’ (our FMC) twin brother has died and she is returning to her small hometown to investigate his death and all the skeletons that get unearthed as a result.

Does that sound familiar? It’s very much like Spells for Forgetting, except James is August handling his mother’s post-mortem affairs and Micah is Emery dealing with the lost love coming home.

I love magical realism, but I wish this book had been more paranormal. The magical part comes from James’ extraordinary soul-connection to her brother, Johnny, to the point that she is getting visions of his life. If I’m being honest, I thought at first that she was just exaggerating the twin-bond joke and it took me a while to come around mentally to it. I also felt like I didn’t know Johnny at all (well, he is dead, to be fair) but despite James’ unreliableness as a narrator when it comes to her brother, for how much Johnny plays a part in this story, I didn’t feel like I connected to him as a character well. I’m going to give a little slack to Young on this point though, because the whole point of the book was James dealing with her grief and not knowing Johnny as well as she thought she did. He was meant to be an enigma.

Ultimately, this book was a little bit to slow-paced for me. Young is a queen of writing atmospheric, reflective fiction but it took me a little bit to get into this story.

Content Warnings