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_myliteraryobsession's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
kadaransmuggler's review against another edition
2.0
This wanted to be a good murder mystery type thing but the whole thing was a drag and it was really cringey. If anyone in this book knew how to have an actual conversation there would be no conflict.
amandala13's review against another edition
5.0
This book had me in the first half haha. It was always exciting to read. The end was really hard and I think that is something good rather them always write a good ending just to make the reader satisfied. I have no bad things about this book :)
mclizzy6710's review against another edition
2.0
This book did not do it for me. It was boring and slow and just meh.
kjimmers211's review against another edition
4.0
HIGHLY recommend listening to this book. The voices and incredible and you’re really able to hear the spiraling of the sisters.
janinam's review against another edition
3.0
I almost gave it 2 stars because the whole short sentences thing really irritated me after a while. And by a while I mean like 20 pages in I was all set with that. Also, some of the thoughts and dialogue was just weird. I did like how it ended though, however I wish Stephen would rot in a ditch somewhere.
nayaxbooks's review against another edition
1.0
I'm not one who usually likes to write reviews about books I disliked but... in this case I will have to make an exception. I did not enjoy this book for one second: the characters were awful, the dialogues were repetitive & just plain boring and the plot did not make sense to me at all. No twist was surprising or original in my opinion and I'm left with the question: what was the point of this book? I loved Sadie by Courtney Summers and was expecting something similiar because that's what the book promised but my god, seems like I totally got catfished.
jessicaswan's review against another edition
4.0
TWs: death of a parent, murder, substance abuse, mental instability
"Sometimes when I dream, I imagine bodies.
Blood. Skin. Bones.
Bodies everywhere.”
I feel like I'm on something after reading this. Like I was in the mind of two girls who clearly weren't mentally stable but I was also trying to figure out what was true and what was not. Who was lying? Who was a real friend? It all just became one mystery for me and I was super intrigued by it.
The ending was quite confusing but I'll be honest, I think it was intended to be that way and I respect the author for that. This story also focuses heavily on grief and how one deals with the loss of a parent.
"Sometimes when I dream, I imagine bodies.
Blood. Skin. Bones.
Bodies everywhere.”
I feel like I'm on something after reading this. Like I was in the mind of two girls who clearly weren't mentally stable but I was also trying to figure out what was true and what was not. Who was lying? Who was a real friend? It all just became one mystery for me and I was super intrigued by it.
The ending was quite confusing but I'll be honest, I think it was intended to be that way and I respect the author for that. This story also focuses heavily on grief and how one deals with the loss of a parent.
celastine's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
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? No
2.0
spencerfantastic's review against another edition
slow-paced
0.5
This is one of the worst books I have read in a long time and I have read over 240 books this year alone. Literally nothing about this book works. The only thing that I liked was how short the chapters were because it (thankfully) made the incredibly slow and dull plot go by faster.
This book is supposed to be based on the Lizzie Borden murders and as someone who is intimately familiar with this case (I grew up outside of Fall River and have even stayed overnight in the Borden house) I can easily say, no it's not. It's like the author heard about this story one time years ago and then didn't bother to do any research into the case when writing this (which, while reading the author note, seems to be true as she admits to basing this on a book she skimmed as a child). I thought perhaps the author would have fun and actually reference the Borden murders or have kids sing the infamous jumprope song that everyone who lives around here knows ('Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother forty wacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty one') but no. The only reason why I didn't dnf was because I wanted to see the murder scenes, but the author fully skips over this part, which was incredibly disappointing.
The plot for this story in stupidly slow and predictable and the 'evidence' that Maddie and Charlotte find to support the theory that their mother was killed was incredibly thin and placed way too far apart to actually feel relevant. The police do no investigation into their mother's death, which makes no sense, even with the reveal at the end. The dual POV was completely unnecessary and added nothing to the plot. Character motivations make absolutely no sense; I don't understand why their father hated them, why Amber was such a bitch about their mother's death, why Stephen was an unsupportive boyfriend who wore black to the funeral, why Uncle Jack was a dick who didn't try to help, or why Lana did what she did. Maddie and Charlotte's deteriorating mental health was supposed to be a major factor to this story but was done incredibly poorly.
Overall, this book was lacking in every way and I don't recommend it to anyone as it is so disappointing. Just go and actually read about the Borden murders instead.
This book is supposed to be based on the Lizzie Borden murders and as someone who is intimately familiar with this case (I grew up outside of Fall River and have even stayed overnight in the Borden house) I can easily say, no it's not. It's like the author heard about this story one time years ago and then didn't bother to do any research into the case when writing this (which, while reading the author note, seems to be true as she admits to basing this on a book she skimmed as a child). I thought perhaps the author would have fun and actually reference the Borden murders or have kids sing the infamous jumprope song that everyone who lives around here knows ('Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother forty wacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave her father forty one') but no. The only reason why I didn't dnf was because I wanted to see the murder scenes, but the author fully skips over this part, which was incredibly disappointing.
The plot for this story in stupidly slow and predictable and the 'evidence' that Maddie and Charlotte find to support the theory that their mother was killed was incredibly thin and placed way too far apart to actually feel relevant. The police do no investigation into their mother's death, which makes no sense, even with the reveal at the end. The dual POV was completely unnecessary and added nothing to the plot. Character motivations make absolutely no sense; I don't understand why their father hated them, why Amber was such a bitch about their mother's death, why Stephen was an unsupportive boyfriend who wore black to the funeral, why Uncle Jack was a dick who didn't try to help, or why Lana did what she did. Maddie and Charlotte's deteriorating mental health was supposed to be a major factor to this story but was done incredibly poorly.
Overall, this book was lacking in every way and I don't recommend it to anyone as it is so disappointing. Just go and actually read about the Borden murders instead.