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3.86 AVERAGE
3.86 AVERAGE
Heed trigger warnings!!! Although Noah was guilty of some harsh actions against Truly, he still won me over by the end. He is now one of my favorite recovering bullies. Truly forgave him and as a reader so can I. Their complicated backgrounds added depth and so much angst to this story. As a Southerner, I’m glad there wasn’t ridiculous Southern slang and glad traditional Southern food was mentioned. Also, the short diary entries by Truly’s mom were a good reflection of the 90s as a teen. The book also had a few moments of humor that helped to ease the heartache caused by heavier moments. I look forward to reading more by this author.
First of all, before reading this book please read the trigger warnings. This book will not be for everyone. It's considered a dark romance and boundaries are definitely crossed. Please be cautious before you start reading.
General reviewTruly is a dark, coming of age romance. It deals with a high-school setting where the characters are spending their last summer after graduation together, before going to college. There are several explicit scenes with and without mutual consent.
I understand why people like or dislike it. There were parts that I personally felt were not okay. But if you're able to look past that it's a story with a decent plot and decent characters, some of which I really liked. I say "decent", because after finishing this book I felt indifferent. It wasn't awful at all, but it wasn't unique either. Remove the morally questionable parts and you get a very average YA coming of age/love story you'll generally be able to find everywhere. It has it's sweet moments, but as I said, it's just missing something that separates it from similar stories.
I also feel a lot of the plot that's laid out in the beginning gets pushed to the background in favour of the explicit scenes. Tru's internal struggles are a very important part of her story and the way she's letting herself be treated by others. But it's hardly ever addressed, unless it is to somehow justify Noah abusing her. I also would've loved to learn a lot more about her relationship with her father, but it's again a part of her emotional struggles that's mentioned and afterwards completely neglected. I feel like it's such a missed opportunity, because it would have made her so much more relatable as a person.
I rated the book 2.5/5 starts. I would've rated it 2 for the story itself I think, but I actually really liked the author's writing style. It's very fluent and nice to read. Sentence flow over into new sentences nicely and it's never too descriptive without cause. If there's anything I dislike it's choppy and over descriptive writing that keeps pulling you out of a story. Not to mention long dialogue without purpose. That absolutely isn't the case with Truly, it's really pleasant to read.
The plotMight include minor spoilers
As I mentioned before, the plot had so many interesting aspects to it. Truly feeling guilty about her mother passing too soon and her dealing with that guilt. Her embarking on a road trip to honour her mother's memory and hopefully finding some peace. But also her relationship with her father who is strict but loving, but who slowly has to let her go to grow up into a woman. All of these were unfortunately left hanging and were only brought up to rationalise Noah's abuse. It's such a shame we didn't get to see more of Truly's inner struggles and her coping with them. In the first part of the book they were there, by the halftime point they were hardly mentioned anymore and by the end of the book they suddenly weren't there at all anymore.
Other than that, the romance between Noah and Truly was questionable. The way they hit off was awful. But Truly trying to get through to him and doing her best to understand where he was coming from was interesting. The fact that Noah blatantly ignored all of these attempts in favour of using her body and crossing every boundary she had was absolutely ridiculous. To me there were no redeeming qualities about Noah's character.
The charactersTruly
Truly was okay, and that about sums it up. She wasn't necessarily a weak character, but she certainly wasn't strong either. I feel like the author wanted to portray her as a stronger character, however her way of defying Noah usually seemed to be for show rather than a sincere demand for respect. At least until quite late in the story. She knows he's bad news and that he did awful things without her consent. Yet somehow because of her tragic past (of course), his abuse is rather quickly deemed okay. It only gets brought up occasionally during a random fight, but it is never really addressed properly which frustrated me. Overall, she wasn't very memorable as a main character, mainly because of the missed depth in her relationships with anyone else but Noah. But I think she could've been really interesting and even have a great character arc, had those aspects been included.
NoahNoah is supposed to be the classic high-school heartthrob who falls for the girl nobody notices in this story, right? Everything about his description points towards that, but in reality he's a violent, abusive stalker who has zero redeeming qualities but a nice physique. He abuses Truly multiple times and refuses to acknowledge it's wrong. He keeps saying 'This is the way I am' and 'You know you like it'. He has no respect for Truly, her privacy and her friendship with others. He's obsessed with her and extremely possessive, he needs to be in a juvenile detention center if anything. Somewhere in the last third of the book his personality magically changes, I say magically because there was no point in the ongoing story where he actively made an effort to be a better person. We're supposed to believe he changed because of his journal where he's written he's trying, really? But by that point he was already a disturbing psychopath to me, so it didn't really work for me personally.
BeccaBecca was the reason I kept reading. She's mature, she's kind and she's a great friend to Truly whenever she gets the chance. I feel like the author didn't do her credit by not having her act on Truly's visible bruises and her mentioning of Noah's violent behaviour. I think Becca, being the personality she is, would have absolutely stepped up but as it would've interfered with the story too much she was kept on some kind of leash. I hated how it was because of her that the boys suddenly joined their road trip, because she'd been friends with Truly for so long I simply can't imagine she wouldn't have understood how important it was to her. Rather than being her own personality she got pushed to being the cause of unfortunate situations a little too often in my opinion. Overall, she was my favourite character, if she wasn't used to cause random situations that made no sense. It also felt weird when she got conveniently replaced Tracy after high school, who was basically the same character with a different name.
DevinPoor Devin, what else is left to say? There wasn't a bad bone in this guy's body, yet they did everything to turn him into the villain that drove her into Noah's arms. He was even sincerely worried about her, but put in such a tough spot because of the concerns about his future. The things he said might've sounded cruel, but they were true. High school sweethearts don't usually last, and he couldn't offer her what she needed. I felt sorry for him whenever Truly blamed him for, well everything she was doing after their break-up.
ConclusionI wouldn't say I'd recommend this book to anyone in particular, unless you're really into forced intimacy and manhandling. Not because I thought it was awful, but because it's missing that je ne sais quoi that would make it unique as opposed to other stories. But when it comes to the 'jock falls for regular girl' trope, I think there are plenty of better options. For example, [b:To All the Boys I've Loved Before|15749186|To All the Boys I've Loved Before (To All the Boys I've Loved Before, #1)|Jenny Han|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1372086100l/15749186._SY75_.jpg|21442106]. So, did I hate it? No, not necessarily. Would I be inclined to recommend it? Probably not.
One of my new all time favorite reads!! I absolutely loveeee when an author can push the boundaries on dark romance and do it WELL. Carmel Rhodes did just that!! Truly was so CURRENT and RELEVANT that it felt like I was literally in Truly's mind. You never had those moments where you felt like what the character was saying or doing was NOT someone their age would normally say or do. I felt like every single aspect of the character and the book were so well articulated that I was just immersed in their world. And holyyyyy... don't even get me STARTED on the filthy steam radiating off the pages! Truly is one of those books I will be going back for more and OFTEN. (Which for me is only a select few of my favorite authors who are able to make me want to live in that world again) Without a doubt one of the best books of 2020! I would tie this with Vicious by AE Murphy which I rated the best book of 2020 for me. That's how much this book blew me away! That a new to me author was able to jump to tie for the top spot! Absolutely phenomenal work by Carmel Rhodes! I will be back for more!
As if it wasn't obvious ... Truly has officially been added to TalkNerdy2me's Must Reads.
Brief Synopsis: Devin abruptly ends things with Truly on graduation day, only for his estranged brother, the basketball prodigy Noah, to step in. Noah is enigmatic and troubled, and when he and a friend crash the girls-only road trip, Truly discovers and embraces all facets of his personality, both light and dark. Yet, the question remains: will her love endure once she learns the lengths Noah went to in order to win her over? This is a semi-dark, coming of age, borderline bully romance with feuding brothers, and badass bffs. Truly and Noah. Recent high school graduates transitioning to adulthood, navigating the very twisted beginnings to their relationship, journeying through the trials of self-worth/discovery and searching for their happily ever after.
The good: I really liked the addition of the journal entries from all the characters. I felt they helped the reader establish a more visceral connection to the moment and added the glimpse into the mind of the writer. I especially liked Noah’s entries.
The bad: I think at different points throughout the book I found it difficult to believe that 17 and 18-year-old teen teenagers would have such a firm understanding and grip on their sexuality as these characters seem to. I don’t know of an 18-year-old guy who would be as articulate as Noah is when he’s millimetres from sex. Just, at times, seemed like a bit of a reach.
Pace: well timed, didn’t feel rushed, and the longer gaps in time seemed appropriate to the story
POV: Single POV (h)
H rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
h rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Spiciness: