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A review by snowwhitehatesapples
Rosebush by Michele Jaffe
3.0
Review can also be found here.
Warning: Major Spoilers
Rosebush is my first ever Michele Jaffe book and I love, love, love it. However, it isn’t perfect and it’s barely even close to it. There are a great number of things that I adore in this book but there’s also a bunch of other things that I don’t. Let’s start with the positives first, shall we?
What I enjoyed from reading this book was the idea for it—the plot line. The mystery and suspense that kept me turning page after page until I reached the end of the book was plenty delightful. Furthermore, the way Jaffe wrote this made the story better. How she alternated between the accident and Jane’s road to recovery added to both said mystery and suspense, bringing the reader a step forward with each following paragraph and making it a fast-paced thriller. Then, there’s Jane. The photographer; the girl who lost her father; the girl who’s so blindingly naïve and eager to please people; the girl who wants to be popular. I love how she’s not perfect and rarely do I like characters—especially leads—who’re so…ingenious. To be honest, they often irritate me to no end! Though, for this story, it worked.
However (Yes, I’m talking/typing about the negatives now), this book probably didn’t have an extremely efficient editor/proof-reader. The tenses were confusing at times and the way Nikki’s name is spelled differently after some chapters makes the effort placed in putting the story into words less…appreciated or meaningful. Sure, I did overlook the name-spelling error as I was too enthralled by the mystery and the suspense but that didn’t mean that I hadn’t realised it once I was done with the book. Plus, what actually happens to both Kate and David? I mean, Jane pretty much kissed and used Kate, her “BFF” while David was Jane’s selfish boyfriend who she totally adored to the max. I get the point that Jane had to break it off with David for her to be with Pete in the end, but still. What about Kate? What about Scott after his creepiness was revealed to Jane and he stormed off? What happened to the secondary characters who seemed to have more that should be told about them, only for them to be “thrown away” after their usefulness is up?
Also, as much as I liked Jane, I don’t like how she kissed three boys in a week. While still hospitalised. I can understand this neediness of hers to be reassured that she’s still beautiful to someone—that she’s still desired even when she looked like hell since it’s sort of part of her characterization, but I found the way her attention flitted from David who was still her boyfriend at that time, to Scott and to Pete, dumb. Really? Girl, really? Just because you realized that your boyfriend’s a douchebag doesn’t mean that your attention can fly to Scott and then, Pete within days. That just makes you reek of desperation. It makes you cheap.
On the other hand, I find Langley a very interesting antagonist. She’s great in acting and she’s a rather smart psychotic! It definitely didn’t cross my mind that she was the one who tried to kill Jane until where it’s revealed that her Chanel bracelet was found by the cops. Poor Ollie, though. Langley sure did have him wrapped around her fingers. Oh, and her poor grandfather too!
Warning: Major Spoilers
Rosebush is my first ever Michele Jaffe book and I love, love, love it. However, it isn’t perfect and it’s barely even close to it. There are a great number of things that I adore in this book but there’s also a bunch of other things that I don’t. Let’s start with the positives first, shall we?
What I enjoyed from reading this book was the idea for it—the plot line. The mystery and suspense that kept me turning page after page until I reached the end of the book was plenty delightful. Furthermore, the way Jaffe wrote this made the story better. How she alternated between the accident and Jane’s road to recovery added to both said mystery and suspense, bringing the reader a step forward with each following paragraph and making it a fast-paced thriller. Then, there’s Jane. The photographer; the girl who lost her father; the girl who’s so blindingly naïve and eager to please people; the girl who wants to be popular. I love how she’s not perfect and rarely do I like characters—especially leads—who’re so…ingenious. To be honest, they often irritate me to no end! Though, for this story, it worked.
However (Yes, I’m talking/typing about the negatives now), this book probably didn’t have an extremely efficient editor/proof-reader. The tenses were confusing at times and the way Nikki’s name is spelled differently after some chapters makes the effort placed in putting the story into words less…appreciated or meaningful. Sure, I did overlook the name-spelling error as I was too enthralled by the mystery and the suspense but that didn’t mean that I hadn’t realised it once I was done with the book. Plus, what actually happens to both Kate and David? I mean, Jane pretty much kissed and used Kate, her “BFF” while David was Jane’s selfish boyfriend who she totally adored to the max. I get the point that Jane had to break it off with David for her to be with Pete in the end, but still. What about Kate? What about Scott after his creepiness was revealed to Jane and he stormed off? What happened to the secondary characters who seemed to have more that should be told about them, only for them to be “thrown away” after their usefulness is up?
Also, as much as I liked Jane, I don’t like how she kissed three boys in a week. While still hospitalised. I can understand this neediness of hers to be reassured that she’s still beautiful to someone—that she’s still desired even when she looked like hell since it’s sort of part of her characterization, but I found the way her attention flitted from David who was still her boyfriend at that time, to Scott and to Pete, dumb. Really? Girl, really? Just because you realized that your boyfriend’s a douchebag doesn’t mean that your attention can fly to Scott and then, Pete within days. That just makes you reek of desperation. It makes you cheap.
On the other hand, I find Langley a very interesting antagonist. She’s great in acting and she’s a rather smart psychotic! It definitely didn’t cross my mind that she was the one who tried to kill Jane until where it’s revealed that her Chanel bracelet was found by the cops. Poor Ollie, though. Langley sure did have him wrapped around her fingers. Oh, and her poor grandfather too!