Reviews

All That Is Mine I Carry with Me by William Landay

christieburke75's review against another edition

dark emotional sad 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

4.0

bookph1le's review against another edition

2.0

I was disappointed in this one. Mega spoilers behind the tag.

Spoiler

I could tell this book's ending was meant to shock me but it didn't. I was already convinced that Dan was guilty. I found it extremely strange that when the serial rapist and murderer "confessed" that he'd killed Jane, neither Jeff nor Miranda seemed to question how their mother's car ended up in the train station parking lot, had the crime played out the way the convict claimed it had. That detail kept smacking me over the head, so I was incredulous that neither of them had noticed. Because of this, the ending wasn't even close to satisfying.

I also felt like Alex was underdeveloped. What made him such an asshole? I could have seen why he'd have been unavailable for his younger siblings had he seemed affected by his mother's disappearance, but he seemed so unaffected by it that I wondered for a while if the twist would be the revelation that he had killed his mother.

I don't even understand what the point was of having Philip in this book.

It drove me up the wall that the book uses quotation marks for the first half of the book but not the last half.

I found this book to be entirely underwhelming. Defending Jacob is much, much better.

jan1955's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.0

b7schecter's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

5.0

sunflowerwoods's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

2.75

mwilkinson89's review against another edition

mysterious reflective slow-paced

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

3.0

jennseeg's review against another edition

dark medium-paced

3.0

lee_hillshire's review against another edition

I was very bored 6 pages in. And it didn't get better from there.

Normally I can look at a book I didn't enjoy, even an objectively bad one, and recognize at least something I can learn from it in terms of story or craft. Here... not so much.

There's a lot of "could haves" with the book and what it was about. Or I suppose, what it tried to be about, because ultimately I don't actually know what this book was about or what it was trying to do. And I don't know what else to say about it.

jansbookcorner's review against another edition

5.0

I couldn’t put this book down until I finished it. Told from different POV’s and in a way that keeps you unsure about the truth. It’s not because of unreliable narrators, it is the story told from different perspectives. The characters were well developed and each of their views fit. Add to all that, the ending was perfect.

It’s been 9 years since I read Defending Jacob and that story has stayed with me. This one will too.

authorjuliankennedy's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix

5.0