Reviews with content warning for Schizophrenia/Psychosis - The Last Word

I refuse to hide this extremely spoilery review for this very important reason: The dog survives! The book will spend an almost cruel amount of time trying to convince you otherwise, though, so be warned.

More spoilers from here on out, as I bravely dare to rate and review a thriller about a murderous writer going after the bored, grieving woman who roasted his book on Amazon. I too am bored and grieving, but this is Goodreads, and I promise not to be too mean.

Anyway.

I am once again absolutely begging thriller writers to please, for the love of God, stop writing villains with mental illness. It is not the fun plot device you think it is! I've known and cared for two people who have Howard's diagnosis, and it's not a goddamn punch line. People with mental illness are far more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators of it. Too, Howard's diagnosis was a red herring. It added nothing to his character except to perpetuate a bunch of gross stereotypes.

That aside, I enjoyed a lot of things about this book. It was entertaining, creepy, full of twists, and the aforementioned (alive!) dog should have been the narrator. I also spent a ton of time rolling my eyes, sending screenshots to my best friend demanding to know how there could be so many hours left in the audiobook by the fifth time I thought it surely had to be drawing to a close, and wondering how many more times Howard was going to bisect something.

This is just a PSA to all white ladies: If you smell synthetic butter around your remote rental house and think a shadowy figure is watching you sleep, do not pass go, do not collect whatever the fuck, do not CONTINUE BLITHELY LIVING IN THE HOUSE — just leave. Also, don't play Hangman with random old men who have telescopes. Also also, how did this genius astrophysicist warrior woman not know what Hangman was?!

A BIG TW BELOW:

tw tw tw tw infant loss!!!

Idk why I keep picking up books that have surprise infant loss plotlines, but lol, I keep finding them. The detail was particularly brutal, and even though I knew it was coming, I sobbed for the last hour of this book.

Lots of other stuff to say about the plot and characters and Emma's interesting range of choices, but I've truly gone on long enough and I'm still not sure how I want to rate it. Twoish stars because...*gestures broadly*

Taylor Adams, if you're reading this, please don't murder me with a katana.

Content Warnings

mflynn8908's review

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The main character irritated me right from the start. She seemed rude, annoying and overall just mean however, once you learn her back story you understand why.
I did guess what was going to happen about 50% into the story but the author had some twists towards the end that made me second guess if I was correct or not so it did keep me invested in reading the story.
This is the second book I’ve read from this author so far and I can say that I actually enjoyed this one much more than I enjoyed no exit.

Content Warnings