Reviews tagging 'Bullying'

They'll Never Catch Us by Jessica Goodman

17 reviews

leexpenandpages's review

adventurous dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

📝 SYNOPSIS:
After a secret-filled summer apart, two sisters who share a passion for cross country running return to school, where a runner better than either of them has just transferred. When tragedy begalls her, the sisters are the top suspects.
👟🍂🏠🔎🚔🕺🏻💔👭👫

👍🏻 RECOMMENDATION:
💚 READ it at your leisure.

💬 FAVORITE QUOTES:
...

👓 FORMAT: 
🎧

📑 COMMENTS:
• Social commentary is woven into both the plot and dialogue naturally. Sisterhood and friendship are core themes, which give an uplifting feeling to dark subjects.

• *Most* of the plot twists are predictable. It takes a surprising amount of time before the disappearance occurs, but that gives the readers time to get to know the character better.

• The ending is beautiful and heart-wrenching (but hopeful), even if it doesn't make sense. Seriously, prepare to suspend your disbelief from around the climax onward. 

• The protagonists' journeys are rewarding. Side characters are developed decently, and some experience growth too. There are occasions where the characters' motivations don't make sense, and I assume we are meant to classify it as teenage stupidity. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Violence, Sexual content, Alcohol, Bullying, Alcoholism, Murder, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Rape, Sexism, Misogyny, and Addiction

Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders and Vomit

Minor: Body shaming

aformeracceleratedreader's review

dark reflective sad medium-paced

3.0

Pretty solid story, but I didn't LOVE it. I liked seeing how the sisters relationship grew and changed. I knew a bunch of people who were in crosscountry so that was pretty cool to read a story centered around a sport people don't really focus on. I think the very end was pretty satisfying. Wish Noah would've faced more consequences tho.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Blood, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Pregnancy, Alcohol, Grief, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Cursing, Abortion, Bullying, Domestic abuse, Mental illness, Sexual content, Eating disorder, Medical content, Murder, Addiction, Child death, Toxic friendship, and Toxic relationship

haley49's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

I really really enjoyed this book. Ya thrillers are very hit or miss and this hit the majority of its beats. I enjoyed the story of sisterhood and how women are often perceived a certain way and it impacts how they are treated by the men in power. I liked the brief inclusion on how this perception of women impacts races differently. 

However, it did slip up in the end and the cause-effect did not seem to add up for certain characters and the ending was a but abrupt. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual violence, Sexism, Abortion, Toxic friendship, Infidelity, and Murder

Moderate: Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Pregnancy, Bullying, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Lesbophobia, Racism, Sexual harassment, Medical content, Physical abuse, Kidnapping, and Sexual content

yananhai's review against another edition

medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

something doesn't add up for me... if Raven just dropped Mila down and left her there dead, why was there a blood trail? why did Ellie and Noah not find her body when they looked in the pit later in the day? why was there a blanket covering her body? 
just for these questions I'm gonna tale off one star, so overall 3 ⭐

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Gaslighting, Bullying, Death, Infidelity, Murder, Abortion, Grief, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Alcoholism

Minor: Alcohol, Eating disorder, Blood, Emotional abuse, and Drug use

beckyremillard's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Bullying, Murder, Blood, Abortion, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Drug abuse, and Emotional abuse

booksofautumn's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Injury/Injury detail, Abortion, Alcoholism, Murder, Pregnancy, Blood, Body shaming, Bullying, Sexual content, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Alcohol, and Violence

luxintenebris's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

honestly with the way it ended, i sort of wish there was an epilogue or a time skip forwards after for the aftermath, but i like the mystery in what happens after the book ends too. Mila deserved better, but there are quite a few layered characters and back stories in this book.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder, Abortion, and Death

Moderate: Addiction, Alcoholism, and Emotional abuse

Minor: Bullying and Eating disorder

lia_reads_123's review

challenging dark emotional medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

I loved this book. It loses a half point because the beginning was slow at some points and the ending was partially predictable (I'll go into more detail at the bottom under spoiler tags). Otherwise, it was amazing. The characters aren't always great people, but you can see why they're doing certain things. The last quarter of the book was my favorite part, because questions started getting answered and pieces started falling into place, just for more questions to be brought up.

I said the ending was partially predictable, and by that I mean Ellie's involvement. Around the time Mila disappeared, the book started focusing much more heavily on Stella's POV and never explained where Ellie was the morning, making it fairly easy to realize Ellie wasn't innocent. However, Raven's involvement was COMPLETELY unpredictable. She would've been the last one I guessed. I did like that it made us think it was just Ellie and Noah, only to reveal that Raven did much worse.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Alcoholism, Child death, and Murder

Moderate: Lesbophobia, Abortion, and Bullying

Minor: Toxic friendship

thelowlysloth's review

dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Bullying

eyeofthestorm's review

dark emotional inspiring mysterious 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

5.0

I loved this book and read it in one day. it's a story focused on two sisters who even though they are not perfect people I actually found very likeable. The story is about the pressures girls face particularly 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Sexism, Addiction, Pregnancy, Racism, Abortion, Bullying, Emotional abuse, Misogyny, and Death