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3.41 AVERAGE
3.41 AVERAGE
I wanted a quick "page-turner" for the beach. This was just so bad but since I'd bought it I finished it. Not recommended. It wasn't fun or interesting. The "surprise" was dumb. Every character was flat and horrible.
3.5 — made myself read it before watching the new movie on Netflix
Noooope. Awful. Main character is just tedious and awful. "Wah! I'm not thin enough! Wah! I need to look seamlessly rich and perfect!"
I get that you had a tragic childhood but ugh! Grow into a useful adult and not this horrid, sniveling shell!
I get that you had a tragic childhood but ugh! Grow into a useful adult and not this horrid, sniveling shell!
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Rape
Moderate: Fatphobia, Homophobia
This book was entertaining enough, but it just kind of fizzled out at the end and I really hated the main character/narrator.
Luckiest Girl Alive is a novel that is a twisted look at society and how we treat one another. it was a quick read that I couldn't put down, in an evil/sick kind of way. The main antagonist is damaged because of things that happened to her in her high school years. Anybody still harboring issues unresolved from traumatic events in their own life such as rape, abortion mass shootings etcetera would be best to not touch this novel.
I thought I would like this book a lot more than I did given the premise and reception. I found Ani to be a completely unsympathetic protagonist, which shocked me given what happened to her. I felt so, so bad for teenage Ani (never understood those girls who were willing to give everything up to be "popular") but had zero sympathy for adult Ani, who is-- to put it lightly-- an absolutely horrendous human being. She's materialistic, manipulative, and completely and totally fake. She detests other women, is obsessed with status, and is so aggressively unhappy with herself that she doesn't enjoy a single second of her life. She's so ashamed of her (totally normal, middle-class) upbringing that it made me embarrassed for her-- such low self-esteem! Overall the book felt SO one-dimensional to me. Every single woman was a bottle-blonde, anorexic/exercise-addicted airhead, and every man was a "finance-bro" cokehead who was easily manipulable and casually cruel. This book made me feel awful about humanity after reading it, which is something I try to avoid (especially these days!)
challenging
dark
hopeful
reflective
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Jessica Knoll always writes a strong female character!
I felt a lot of ups and downs while reading this book. I like books where the narration switches between the present and the past, but sometimes this jumped too quickly and was it was hard to make that switch. Then there was our narrator, the main character, TifAni (which... *seriously*??). From the start you realize she is just a mean girl. The most insecure, self-centered mean-girl I've read in a long time. Her obsessions as an adult include being skinnier than everyone else, being more New York than anyone else, designer labels (but done *just* right), and sex. She is just all show. I can't stand her reasonings. Her obsessions as a teenager include getting popular, being wealthy, labels, and sex. Ultimately, her entire life is centered around being the shining star amongst everyone she knows and sex. It made her completely unlikable and totally unrelatable. And then there's the plot: Everyone here on Goodreads is comparing Luckiest Girl Alive to Gone Girl, and I'm just not seeing it. Everyone is talking about all the twists. There was exactly one twist that I didn't see coming. And I don't know that I'd call it a twist so much as I didn't see this event coming as part of the story. The story deals with so much dark material, and it made me sad and anxious throughout. However, there is SO much that is worthy of discussion and should be discussed more often. I was shocked and dismayed by the actions of so many of these characters, especially the high school ones. I just don't see my friends or most of the kids I knew at that age as acting like that, but I do know that those things happen. It's all over the news all the time. You'd think we'd be used to it by now, but we're not. Anyway, it hurt me on an emotional scale to read the words they said to each other, to read the actions they took with one another, and it just seemed to *accepted*, like it was totally normal behavior. It makes me wonder how people can live in a world like that and not try to change things, to make things better. Change the culture and environment they are in to a more positive one. Here I am, rambling on about fiction... but I know there is a basis of truth in it all. So overall... yeah, I ended up liking the book. Still can't stand Ani (that's what TifAni insists she go by as an adult), but that doesn't mean it wasn't a pretty well written book. For my sensitive reader friends: this is chock full of offensive language and graphic details of sex and rape.
not really sure what all the hype is about this book! no twists or turns, just blah...