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minna94's review against another edition
dark
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
rlchen383's review against another edition
3.75
Darkly violent and sexual, this book explored deep secrets of the human psyche in two teenage lives
sjskinner's review against another edition
4.0
Definitely very slow, introspective. I enjoyed the relationship between the Krista and Aaron, although it was quite dysfunctional. The ending felt true to the characters and the story even if it wasn’t entirely satisfying. Overall, I enjoyed the book even with the slow bits.
danbydame's review against another edition
4.0
Yes, this is a "hits the soft spot" 4 stars. I love JCO. And I love stories set in the gritty, past-its-prime upstate NY that I understand so well. So this book gets mentally shelved with other JCO and alongside Richard Russo and Russell Banks.
If those stories are your thing, then this will be too.
But what is it? Its an exploration of how an event like a crime of passion murder hurts so many more people than just the victim and those accused of the crime. In this case, the murder victim is a mother, the accused are her husband and her lover, but the true victims are the children of those in this love triangle. The story is the children and how much they lose, and how it seems to go unnoticed by those who should care.
If those stories are your thing, then this will be too.
But what is it? Its an exploration of how an event like a crime of passion murder hurts so many more people than just the victim and those accused of the crime. In this case, the murder victim is a mother, the accused are her husband and her lover, but the true victims are the children of those in this love triangle. The story is the children and how much they lose, and how it seems to go unnoticed by those who should care.
blahmarley's review against another edition
2.0
I really wanted to like this book as I like Joyce carol Oates. The book was very boring. I kept waiting for something interesting/exciting to happen and it never did. It took me forever to get through as I really didn't enjoy it.
amysbrittain's review against another edition
2.0
Had to really work to get through this one. Lots of minute detail at times, often to no apparent end, and I felt discombobulated switching points of view late in the book after spending much of the book in one character's mind. The pseudo-mystery at the heart of it is resolved anticlimactically. Do I even like Joyce Carol Oates's books in the first place, or am I misremembering?
sushai's review against another edition
2.0
Oates is one of my favorite authors for her poetic prose, but listening to this book on CD was interminable. Partly because of a narrator who reads the entire thing as if a Shakespeare soliloquy; partly because the story is drawn out to twice its needed length by repetition and long character speeches. I would not recommend it.
thesassybookworm's review against another edition
1.0
100 pages in and this is just not capturing me, so going to set it aside!
erinngillespie's review
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
thekinkykid's review against another edition
3.0
Hay que reconocer que esta no es de los mejores libros de Oates, porque aunque la calidad de la escritura es excelente como siempre, la historia no, es pesada y llega a ser aburrida, y aunque la estructura que tiene la novela al principio es interesante, después se vuelve un problema.