Reviews

Through The Pieces by Bobbi Jo Green

drowninginthewords_jessica's review

fast-paced

2.5

I very rarely give a book less than 3 stars. I'm not who I used to be- a completionist who finishes every book she picks up. If I don't enjoy a book by page 100 I DNF it. This was a short novel at 155 pages and I didn't have any other books downloaded with spotty wifi so I finished it (note to self always keep a second book downloaded).

I didn't find myself able to connect to the characters and I 100% believe it's the length. It felt like a detailed outline that I've known several people write and is missing the heart of the story. Buck comes off as too good a man without faults and we never saw growth in Claire- there was an 8 month time skip which would have been the perfect place to strengthen the bond between Claire and Buck even if they were spaced weeks apart so it felt less like insta love between the main characters.

There was also one of my hard no's and the moment this dipped below 3 stars for me- the sequel assault scene. There were two. The first was a moderately detailed one and the second was a fade to black. In my opinion they were completely unnecessary even as a fade to black. The first character wasn't even named and only showed up in that one scene. There are better ways to show Paul's obsession growing and I don't get his motivations for teaming up with Jenny or even how they met. There were times in the plot they could have met but wasn't shown. So many little plot holes and unanswered questions. Paul either needed to be guessed out more with more chapters through his POV or they needed to be cut altogether.

There is a surprise pregnancy trope at the end. I know a lot of people don't enjoy them.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Rape and Physical abuse

elliereadsss's review

dark hopeful tense fast-paced

This book clearly impacted me, as I still think about it over a month after I finished reading it. I liked the family dynamic that was set up, as well as other relationships such as the romance which I particularly loved. I appreciated the more hard hitting theme of domestic abuse and what it brought to the story, but definitely didn't enjoy Scott's perspective as much and just wanted to get back to the main story. A smaller thing that I picked up on, particularly at the beginning of the book, was the lack of contractions especially in speech. It made the book feel like it was trying to be more formal than it was in my opinion. One of my favourite parts of the book was the intense end- but on the other hand this definitely felt somewhat rushed and I think the book could have benefitted from being overall longer. Despite my criticisms, I'm glad I read this book and would recommend it if it interests you.