Reviews with content warning for Suicide attempt - Yours Truly

Reviews tagging 'Suicide attempt'

Yours Truly by Abby Jimenez

4 reviews

kfmcf's review

slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

I feel like I read a different book than everyone else.
I liked "Part of Your World". I didn't love it, but I still thought it was sweet and enjoyable. This one *irked* me. For a few reasons:

1) there are slow burns and then there are books that just need a bit of editing to trim the fat. This was the latter. Was it egregious? No. But it was a bit of a slog.

2) Jacob's anxiety was pretty unbelievable. I suffer from pretty terrible anxiety, specially social anxiety and have had my own journey of working through it. Everyone is unique so I don't expect monolithic occurrences, but my issue really lies in the fact that we knew nothing about Jacob OUTSIDE of his anxiety. That was it. And it felt like Briana liked him because she could mold him to what she needed.

3) I remember having a little bit of a problem with Jimenez's writing in POYW (in the first series so much) but I thought she had grown as a writer. This prose felt really immature and also didn't feel natural for people under 40 to use as dialogue. Does anyone under 40 use "u" and "r" while texting?

4) This book was ableist. The dog's name is Lieutenant Dan as an homage to "Forrest Gump". Cute. However, when acknowledging this reference, he is just referred to as "the amputee from Forrest Gump." ??! Excuse me?! There are so many less offensive ways to saw who the character is - Gary Sinise's character, the man who loses his leg in the Vietnam War, Forrest's shipmate. Just...insensitive. And outside of Briana's family the diversity of the characters feels very shoehorned in and ingenuine. Can we stop just referring to characters as Asian? It's an entire continent with a plethora of countries and cultures.

5) This one is a spoiler.

this is Jimenez's SECOND BOOK WITH A SURPRISE PREGNANCY. How is she forgiven for this when so many other authors are not? It's not done any better! It's telegraphed super early on when they're talking about naming a kid Xfinity and Briana says she likes the name Ava. And then the first time they have sex, it's unprotected. And why was EVERYONE PREGNANT. Alexis, I get, but Amy AND Kelly AND BRIANA. Oy. I'm exhausted by this. And I don't believe that they would magically be fine and stay together. They barely knew each other.

6) We get it. You own Nadia Cakes. 5 mentions is too many mentions. And even beyond that it was a lot of brand name and pop culture dropping, jeepers.

7) This is one of the most atrocious examples of miscommunication I have ever encountered. Tbh I am a miscommunication apologist BUT i do think that miscommunication has what i consider two paths it can go down: missed communication and withheld communication. Missed communication is par for the course for relationships. It's crossed wires, mistakes, saying the wrong things. Withheld communication is when you DON'T TALK TO EACH OTHER AND FESTER OVER INCORRECT INFORMATION. Briana is a 35-year-old woman. This felt like high school nonsense. It was so so much of the book. It was the ENTIRETY of act 2.

I truly believe there was a solid and lovely idea here that just got muddled by mishandled tropes and overexaggeration. This is the 2nd strike for this author for me (looking at you "The Friend Zone") and I'll give her a 3rd, but oof...begrudgingly. And only because I liked two of her other books.

Content Warnings