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3.59 AVERAGE
3.59 AVERAGE
Best use I've ever seen of an Unreliable Narrator, to make the reader doubt every fact laid out.
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This is a psychological thriller. The author builds complex suspense through out the whole story and leaves shivers down a reader's spine all the way til the very last sentence.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal cruelty, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Blood, Grief, Murder, Gaslighting, Alcohol
I absolutely loved this read. Could not put down, but would recommend content warnings.
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The atmosphere in this book is insane. It’s so eerie from the very first page. I didn’t find myself getting very attached to the main character, although she was incredibly well written, but the plot and atmosphere made up for it tenfold.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Gaslighting, Alcohol
Moderate: Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Murder
Minor: Animal death, Gun violence, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
mysterious
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:
Yes
Although I did enjoy the aesthetic of this book, the ending made me so mad at the author that I can’t rate it any higher than this.
oooooooh boy i think i've got a lot of thoughts and this is gonna be long? maybe? idk. i think this lands around a 3.5 for me, and i'm gonna round up bc of how lush and evocative the writing was.
i'm trying to read a bunch of dark academia vibe books this fall. i've read quite a few, but i'm catching up on ones that i've not gotten around to. (and might do a re-read of some, too. it will depend on my mood, though i DID buy a 3 dollar copy of the secret history bc i refuse to spend a lot of money on a book that i remember not liking, and mostly plan to read and hate annotate. but that is a whole other conversation). this one has been on my radar for a little while, but i was kinda not feeling much ya the last few years, but i've gotten back into it (sporadically) in the last little while.
on the dark academia front: this is a banger. the vibes are all there. the kids are pretentions as hell. the atmosphere is top notch and the writing and imagery are steller. the school does feel a little more like these kids should be in college already and not high school, and yet, i can also buy that a bunch of spoiled, intellectual, rich kids are left to their own devices like this, and are scrambling to act older and more mature than they are.
on the atmospheric/autumnal front: also solid. this absolutley got me in the mood (the suddenly cool day that felt like fall while i read the book mostly today out on my porch helped, but it was enhanced by the read). the mystery elements in the first half were really solid. the witchy vibes, the tarot, the tea leaves, the pretentious poetry readings and kids refusing to use phones and laptops (lol, hilarious and pretentious) fit the vibe wonderfully. not quite knowing what is going on with felicity, what really happened with alex, what is currently happening with ellis (bc baby, i was suspicious of that girl from day dot. she's too pretentious and weird for me not to be. but i'm judgemental like that). it all worked really well in the first half of the book for me. you don't know if this is magic, or felicity's guilt and mental illness.
and then the third act twist happens.
i'm gonna get into spoilery territory, bc, frankly, i gotta yap about this, but the non-spoilery, vauge version is that overall, i liked the way that things ended up quite a lot, but i didn't entierly love the execution that it took to get there. and i did originally think that this was leading somwhere else, a bit more mystical than we got, and was down for and kind of wanted that book more, but i did end up liking the one we got.
(also, this is not a romance. it's queer. it's sapphic, but this is not a romance novel). which is fine! but just in case anyone wanted that going in... it's really not that nor the focus. it's HEAVILY focused on sapphic relationships, but it is not a romance and that is an important distinction.
the spoiler version is:
NOW! onto the felicity front: whew. i feel fine with her pushing ellis off the roof. i do. i'm a little conflicted of the alex of it all. it's def implied that she did actually also kill her?? but it's also not... totally confirmed?? there are just so many versions of alex's death that felicity says over the course of the book (the mountain and the rope, falling and drowning in an accident after they fight, and then the idea that she pushed on purpose, but didn't mean to kill, and then the bits of burrying her underneath the school in the end. i'm pretty sure that one is supposed to be the true one? they fought, she pushed, not meaning to push her over/kill her, but then couldn't save her and panicked and burried her?? i don't love that reveal as much, but... i don't entierly hate it as a concept. i do think that it got there a little?? too fast. the time between the ellis reveal, the ellis death, and the alex reveal, and felicity in the epiloge being weirdly detatched from her new gf, was much faster compared to the slow burn of the first half.
i did kind of want more of the witchy vibes to be real. and overall, was more interested in that book than the mundane murderous rich, pretentious ambitious kids, but also.... THAT'S THE REAL HORROR, YA KNOW??
i'm trying to read a bunch of dark academia vibe books this fall. i've read quite a few, but i'm catching up on ones that i've not gotten around to. (and might do a re-read of some, too. it will depend on my mood, though i DID buy a 3 dollar copy of the secret history bc i refuse to spend a lot of money on a book that i remember not liking, and mostly plan to read and hate annotate. but that is a whole other conversation). this one has been on my radar for a little while, but i was kinda not feeling much ya the last few years, but i've gotten back into it (sporadically) in the last little while.
on the dark academia front: this is a banger. the vibes are all there. the kids are pretentions as hell. the atmosphere is top notch and the writing and imagery are steller. the school does feel a little more like these kids should be in college already and not high school, and yet, i can also buy that a bunch of spoiled, intellectual, rich kids are left to their own devices like this, and are scrambling to act older and more mature than they are.
on the atmospheric/autumnal front: also solid. this absolutley got me in the mood (the suddenly cool day that felt like fall while i read the book mostly today out on my porch helped, but it was enhanced by the read). the mystery elements in the first half were really solid. the witchy vibes, the tarot, the tea leaves, the pretentious poetry readings and kids refusing to use phones and laptops (lol, hilarious and pretentious) fit the vibe wonderfully. not quite knowing what is going on with felicity, what really happened with alex, what is currently happening with ellis (bc baby, i was suspicious of that girl from day dot. she's too pretentious and weird for me not to be. but i'm judgemental like that). it all worked really well in the first half of the book for me. you don't know if this is magic, or felicity's guilt and mental illness.
and then the third act twist happens.
i'm gonna get into spoilery territory, bc, frankly, i gotta yap about this, but the non-spoilery, vauge version is that overall, i liked the way that things ended up quite a lot, but i didn't entierly love the execution that it took to get there. and i did originally think that this was leading somwhere else, a bit more mystical than we got, and was down for and kind of wanted that book more, but i did end up liking the one we got.
(also, this is not a romance. it's queer. it's sapphic, but this is not a romance novel). which is fine! but just in case anyone wanted that going in... it's really not that nor the focus. it's HEAVILY focused on sapphic relationships, but it is not a romance and that is an important distinction.
the spoiler version is:
Spoiler
OKAY!! I WAS SUS OF ELLIS FROM THE BEGINNING, AND I FELT VERY JUSTIFIED IN MY DISTRUST WHEN THE REVEAL HAPPENS. WHAT A LITTLE PSYCHO!!! i mean, my god did she set out to seduce her from the beginning? is she even queer for real? or was that convenient? ugh. the absolute GALL of making a girl think she was crazy, framing her for murder, COMMITTING said murder, and being so GODDAMN EXTRA as to burry the girl that you murdered in the empty coffin of the dead gf of the girl that you are fucking and framing IN ORDER TO 'METHOD WRITE' (WHICH ISN'T EVEN A THING YOU GODDAMN PRETENTIOUS WEIRDO) A BOOK SO YOU CAN CONTINUE TO BE A PRODIGY IS... WILD. honestly, i don't support violence, but she got what was comming to her.NOW! onto the felicity front: whew. i feel fine with her pushing ellis off the roof. i do. i'm a little conflicted of the alex of it all. it's def implied that she did actually also kill her?? but it's also not... totally confirmed?? there are just so many versions of alex's death that felicity says over the course of the book (the mountain and the rope, falling and drowning in an accident after they fight, and then the idea that she pushed on purpose, but didn't mean to kill, and then the bits of burrying her underneath the school in the end. i'm pretty sure that one is supposed to be the true one? they fought, she pushed, not meaning to push her over/kill her, but then couldn't save her and panicked and burried her?? i don't love that reveal as much, but... i don't entierly hate it as a concept. i do think that it got there a little?? too fast. the time between the ellis reveal, the ellis death, and the alex reveal, and felicity in the epiloge being weirdly detatched from her new gf, was much faster compared to the slow burn of the first half.
i did kind of want more of the witchy vibes to be real. and overall, was more interested in that book than the mundane murderous rich, pretentious ambitious kids, but also.... THAT'S THE REAL HORROR, YA KNOW??
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes