Reviews tagging 'Infidelity'

Blame by Jeff Abbott

1 review

therapybard2021's review against another edition

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mysterious tense 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

4.0

TLDR: This book is good in many ways, but that's all it is. I had fun reading it since it has a well thought out plot with a handful of interesting characters. Still, I doubt this book with stick with me very long.

Positives
  • I normally hate the amnesia trope you see in mysteries, but Abbott leaning into it as much as he did turned its use here into a positive. I particularly like the way the story empathizes how everyone has used Jane's amnesia to erase parts of her they don't like and keep the parts they do.
  • Jane and Perri are interesting characters to sit in the head of. Perri especially is hard to like at first but it becomes increasingly easy to understand her perspective and root for her to be better. It's a hard character type to pull off and I think Abbott did it well.
  • Most of the twists are things a reader can pick up on if they are paying attention while not slipping into predictability. Even when it is predicable it's fun to be along for the ride with these characters as they piece things together.
  • This is a very me thing, but I like how generally good the characters. Don't get me wrong; they are far from saints, but for the most part you can see how most of the people Jane and Perri interact with are at their core good people. They just make bad decisions from time to time. This feels more realistic that just throwing an evil person in for drama, though I would argue 
    Kamala
      falls into that category.
Negatives
  • Therapists aren't portrayed the best in this book. It's not full on vilification and the things that happen here do happen in real life sometimes, but I would have preferred some acknowledgement from one of the characters (that doesn't have an ulterior motive) that therapists and mental health services are for the most part good. If this was the only problem I had with the book, this wouldn't knock it down. This is just a pet peeve of mine. Therapists get a bad rep in far too many books.
  • Parts of the ending came out of nowhere 
    The whole sex/drug trafficking thing could have been replaced with anything and it probably should have been. It was a level of evil beyond anything the book had set up before that point and it really threw me off.
  • Overall, nothing in this book stands out to me as overly great. If I'm being honest, I'll probably forget most of it within the next couple weeks. It's a good read but I can't say I'd recommend it to anyone.
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