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3.7 AVERAGE
3.7 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Reminded me of the show FROM
2.5 Stars
A common problem, but the book is too long. It’s supposed to be suspenseful, but a plodding investigation doesn’t provide the right atmosphere to keep that suspense building. The book is also ultimately about grief, which could be a horror concept, but it’s not executed well enough here. So it sort of suffers from a personality problem, where it wants to be a supernatural thriller, an investigative mystery, and a story about coping with loss all at once, while never totally succeeding in artfully tying those separate threads together.
Book also isn’t particularly well written. It’s a debut by a guy who got his start writing reddit horror, so maybe there’s room to grow here, but it suffers from a lot of common mistakes. The characters are all pretty hollow, and not very interesting. The technique of adding letters and audio interviews is something that seems clever in theory, but it ultimately results in the author “telling instead of showing”, which is one of my least favorite writerly pitfalls - a character monologuing about how another character’s personality instead of just showing us that behavior and letting us draw our own conclusions, a character retelling events that have already happened rather than letting them unfold on the page. I also as a personal pet peeve hate book intros that are like “What you’re about to read is crazy but trust me it’s true” - like bro, no it’s not. It’s a fiction book lmao. Just start the book.
A common problem, but the book is too long. It’s supposed to be suspenseful, but a plodding investigation doesn’t provide the right atmosphere to keep that suspense building. The book is also ultimately about grief, which could be a horror concept, but it’s not executed well enough here. So it sort of suffers from a personality problem, where it wants to be a supernatural thriller, an investigative mystery, and a story about coping with loss all at once, while never totally succeeding in artfully tying those separate threads together.
Book also isn’t particularly well written. It’s a debut by a guy who got his start writing reddit horror, so maybe there’s room to grow here, but it suffers from a lot of common mistakes. The characters are all pretty hollow, and not very interesting. The technique of adding letters and audio interviews is something that seems clever in theory, but it ultimately results in the author “telling instead of showing”, which is one of my least favorite writerly pitfalls - a character monologuing about how another character’s personality instead of just showing us that behavior and letting us draw our own conclusions, a character retelling events that have already happened rather than letting them unfold on the page. I also as a personal pet peeve hate book intros that are like “What you’re about to read is crazy but trust me it’s true” - like bro, no it’s not. It’s a fiction book lmao. Just start the book.
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I really wanted to love this (I’m a sucker for a creepy island) and I did when it first started but this was just way too long for me.
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
very few books have actually spooked me like this one! i was quite impressed with how the story ended too, i spent a while wondering how he was going to wrap it all up and i thoroughly enjoyed it! honestly would make a great tv series
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Thus was interesting and I read it fairly quickly but not what I was expecting. It was creepy but not horror enough for me. Definitely a solid read though.
This was a fun horror mystery with an outrageous premise, although I think it might have oversold on the idea of this remote island repeating every day as if they were in 1980s, since it was more, a story of a brother's feeling of responsibility and regret over his relationship with his missing sister.