Reviews with content warning for Chronic illness - Verity

This book started well. And then it went down hill.

This is my first Colleen Hoover book, and I don't know how I have gotten away with not reading any of her books this summer, as the likes of Verity, It Starts With Us, Reminders of Him and Ugly Love (which I now own) were plastered all over TikTok. All of these books have extremely high ratings so I was excited to jump on the Colleen Hoover train. I was met with disappointment.

First lets start with what I liked about this book. I couldn't put it down. I actually really liked Hoover's writing style. It read well and I was engaged throughout the whole book. I know that psychological thriller is not Hoover's usual writing genre but I thought she did a good job at creating a disturbing atmosphere and executed jump scares well. There were moments my heart was racing and my neck was sweating. For this reason, I see why people liked this book. The ending divided audiences who still talk about it years after Verity was publicised. For positives, this book gets a 2 star.

Now lets get into what I didn't like about this book:

- My biggest annoyance was the lack of character development for Lowen and Jeremy. Lowen had absolutely nothing to do with the plot whatsoever! I was speculating that Lowen would reveal secrets of her own and a connection to Jeremy or Verity, but no. She is just a writer. The entire book would have been the same without her.

- Also, what was the point of Lowen's deep trauma with her mum and all the sleepwalking rubbish? An attempt to move the plot forward or show her connection with Jeremy?

- The relationship between Jeremy and Lowen was NOT developed enough! I couldn't understand their relationship beyond the obvious sexual attraction. Make the book 50 pages longer if you have to give your audience a fully fleshed out, realistic relationship.

- Verity's letter felt like hand-holding and explicitly pointing out the big twist and reveal instead of cleverly and subtly letting the reader figure it out. Would have been better through a flash-back?

- The plot started well until half-way through the book I realised it wasn't going anywhere. Nothing else was happening. Lowen was continually shocked at what she was reading in Verity's manuscript and that was it. It just felt like I was waiting until the end for a twist I knew was coming.

- The decision to kill off Verity in the way that Jeremy did was..odd? He had so many other opportunities to kill her so why did he wait? Lowen's actions were also so unrealistic. Why wait until the final, possible moment to tell Jeremy about the manuscript?

- I never read the extended final chapter because from reviews I have read, it completely ruins the entire book and to be honest, I don't have the energy to care about these dumb characters anymore.

Right. I feel like I got everything out that I needed to. I'll probably read Ugly Love this year because I already spent money on it and I have a genuine curiosity as to why people love Colleen Hoover so much. Please someone make me understand.

Content Warnings

victoriag03's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense

3.0

holy shit i was expecting some sort of ending twist but not like that, the last line …wow

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anielabooks's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No

5.0

Very entertaining book. Something very different from Colleen’s romance books that I’ve read. It was very eerie and tense at times, which I loved. This might be my second favorite Colleen book I’ve read.

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