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3.81 AVERAGE
3.81 AVERAGE
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-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:
Yes
El principio del libro (y hasta el 30% casi) se me hizo MUY repetitivo, la manera en la que estaba escrita (usando "Marin..." cada dos por tres) me sacaba tanto de la lectura que estuve a punto de abandonarlo solo por eso, pero decidí darle uma oportunidad porque sáficas y es verdad que luego mejora cuando van dando importancia a otros personajes.
La trama me recuerda mucho a Bly Manor pero esta es la versión cutre y mala. Marin toma decisiones bastante cuestionables y hay como reflexiones internas que hace que no tienen mucho sentido (encima están escritas en tercera persona y se me hacía raro). También me parece bastante predecible la gran mayoría de cosas, exceptuando dos cosas al final y tampoco fueron una gran revelación que digamos.
De los personajes poco tengo que decir. Marin, la protagonista me parece un poco aburrida e incoherente, muchas veces las acciones que toma no tiene ningún sentido con cosas que ha pensado previamente. Y el resto muy chimpun la verdad porque es que no se molestan en desarrollarlas mucho, quitando un poco a Evie, Wren y Thea pero tampoco es algo loco.
En general me parece un libro más bien malo pero bueno si queréis algo para pasar el rato pues está bien.
La trama me recuerda mucho a Bly Manor pero esta es la versión cutre y mala. Marin toma decisiones bastante cuestionables y hay como reflexiones internas que hace que no tienen mucho sentido (encima están escritas en tercera persona y se me hacía raro). También me parece bastante predecible la gran mayoría de cosas, exceptuando dos cosas al final y tampoco fueron una gran revelación que digamos.
De los personajes poco tengo que decir. Marin, la protagonista me parece un poco aburrida e incoherente, muchas veces las acciones que toma no tiene ningún sentido con cosas que ha pensado previamente. Y el resto muy chimpun la verdad porque es que no se molestan en desarrollarlas mucho, quitando un poco a Evie, Wren y Thea pero tampoco es algo loco.
En general me parece un libro más bien malo pero bueno si queréis algo para pasar el rato pues está bien.
More like a 3.5 or possibly slightly higher, but not quite a 4. I feel like it relies fairly heavily on the comparison to the Haunting of Bly Manner, but that isn't entirely unjustified. There were moments that felt bleak, spine chilling, and ominous. The house felt claustrophobic and I am pretty much always down for an exploration of a dysfunctional family grieving in their own ways. To me, creepy kids also enhances the eeriness of a haunted house rather than distracts from it, but I could see people not liking that aspect. There were a few pacing issues that honestly made the book drag in some aspects. The beginning and end were thrilling, but the middle felt so much loner than it actually was. There was also a bit of insta-love - which I think makes sense for the YA genre but it isn't something that I particularly enjoy a ton. I really liked it, though, and found the eery, claustrophobic atmosphere to be one of my favorite aspects.
This book feels very much like The Haunting of Bly Manor. It's a sapphic horror novel which does feel very much YA especially due to the innocent romance that blossomed between Evie and Marin. There were some major twists and turns, that I was not expecting and I loved the gruesome and gory scenes shown throughout this book. It all started with a creepy house and even creepier little girls. I honestly was not expecting this book to be as good as it was. I didn't really read the synopsis before diving in, but I was ever less prepared for the way this book ended. It was literally such a wild ride.
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-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:
No
for fans of House of Hollow, Horrid, What Moves the Dead, A House with Good Bones, and probably more that my 12:30am brain can't think of rn because I stayed up to finish this super eerie, twisty, decently gory book! new favorite YA horror for sure.
dark
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
My, what a soulless book.
Listen, if you're going to sell your book to me as a Gothic horror, I need you to absolutely nail two things, and two things only: characterization and atmosphere. Unfortunately, both of these were bland as cardboard in All the Dead Lie Down.
Not one character felt like an authentic person to me, but I could've lived with that if they'd at least been interesting. Instead, everyone is more or less interchangeable, and that is a problem when you have significant age differences between a lot of them. Our main character Marin was especially underdeveloped considering she's constantly in the forefront, and because she was underdeveloped and bland, so was the romance that made me feel absolutely nothing.
As for the atmosphere, it felt like the author was recounting a Gothic horror movie she had once seen. The outline was there, but it's like she forgot to color in her picture, and it ended up feeling as inauthentic and dull as everything else. There was a point around three quarters in where it felt like it would finally escalate into, I don't know, something, but it was all more of the same and by that point it would've also been too little, too late.
There's nothing this book did offensively wrong (although the anxiety and grief representation is tragically shallow as well), but it just gave me nothing to get excited over and I can't justify anything more than two stars because of it. I doubt I'd pick up the author a second time.
Listen, if you're going to sell your book to me as a Gothic horror, I need you to absolutely nail two things, and two things only: characterization and atmosphere. Unfortunately, both of these were bland as cardboard in All the Dead Lie Down.
Not one character felt like an authentic person to me, but I could've lived with that if they'd at least been interesting. Instead, everyone is more or less interchangeable, and that is a problem when you have significant age differences between a lot of them. Our main character Marin was especially underdeveloped considering she's constantly in the forefront, and because she was underdeveloped and bland, so was the romance that made me feel absolutely nothing.
As for the atmosphere, it felt like the author was recounting a Gothic horror movie she had once seen. The outline was there, but it's like she forgot to color in her picture, and it ended up feeling as inauthentic and dull as everything else. There was a point around three quarters in where it felt like it would finally escalate into, I don't know, something, but it was all more of the same and by that point it would've also been too little, too late.
There's nothing this book did offensively wrong (although the anxiety and grief representation is tragically shallow as well), but it just gave me nothing to get excited over and I can't justify anything more than two stars because of it. I doubt I'd pick up the author a second time.
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
3.5
This was a fun book, I really liked all the characters and where the store ended up. However, I couldn't help but get distracted and ended up walking away to read other things once or twice. I don't completely understand why but I didn't get as sucked into the story as I expected.
This was a fun book, I really liked all the characters and where the store ended up. However, I couldn't help but get distracted and ended up walking away to read other things once or twice. I don't completely understand why but I didn't get as sucked into the story as I expected.