Reviews tagging 'Domestic abuse'

In My Dreams I Hold a Knife by Ashley Winstead

4 reviews

duckydarlingg's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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vaguely_pink's review against another edition

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dark 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? Yes

3.5

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avhxqz's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

★★☆☆☆

(+1.0 for Heather my girl deserved better..)

TWS : SEXUAL ASSAULT , DRUG ABUSE , ATTEMPTED SUICIDE , DOMESTIC VIOLENCE , MURDER , DISORDERED EATING

This was underwhelming. The characters were disgusting horrible human beings especially Jessica and her backstory justifies nothing. Theres too much cheating and the twists and turns sucked. These characters are 32 and act like high schoolers. Somehow they also dont change whatsoever in a whole decade. The mystery was also so horrible. It was obvious who did it and there was no way they could’ve got away with it. The “flashbacks” were almost always unnecessary and lengthy. This is literal the adult version “One of Us is lying” but with horrible characters. All of these characters deserve to rot in hell.
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justnei's review against another edition

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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

4.0

right off the bat, i liked this one because the friendship dynamic, setting (a higher education institution), and murder premise reminded me of If We Were Villains which was one of my favourite books of last year. i enjoyed the flipping between timelines and having Jessica Miller as the main narrator. I was compelled by her feelings of wanting to be the best and it never felt too cliche or on the nose. initially, i really enjoyed how things would get revealed in the Now chapters and then we'd flashback to the Then chapters to see how it went down but after awhile the technique felt overused.
there were slightly too many twists and reveals so eventually you just knew that the accused person of the chapter wouldn't actually be the murderer.
the mystery wasn't particularly hard to solve, but i was just enjoying the ride of this messed up friend group who seemed to love and hate each other genuinely and in equal measure. 

i feel like my enjoyment of the story didn't necessarily come from the characters -they were just fine... with the exception of Courtney who was the cliched catty mean girl of the story (which i always hate because i feel like it devolves into one-note cliches). i like my catty mean girls with more nuance! i did enjoy the peeling back of their motivations and personalities though. overall, a good and quick read that's great if you enjoy books with sketchy narrators, fractured and incestuous friend groups, and lots of twists.
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