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jasminks 's review for:
A Restless Truth
by Freya Marske
I have VERY mixed feelings about this book. The review was going to be all ranty (lol it still is), not the least because I'm perpetually in a bad mood these days, but then the last third of the book happened and now I am CONFUSED af as to what to think and how to review??? I was all ”nnnghhnnghhhh??” up until like page ~250 or something. But then somewhere around the 2/3 mark I found myself soaring through the rest of it.
The writing was as good as ever. Worth 5 stars. I liked how the titles of both A Marvellous Light and A Restless Truth were hinted at/brought up amidst the story just very subtly (I think it was just once), and I was all for the themes of vulnerability and layers of a person and all that. I ended up really liking both Maud and Violet, even though I wasn’t at all sure how I felt about either of them at first (and for a long time, too, after the initial nngghnghhhh). Many of the side characters I really liked, though, from beginning to end.
The romance. HmmMMHHH. Mild spoilers -->
But yeah I also kinda appreciated how in A Marvellous Light you had two dudes and a hell of a lot more feeling and emotion (as in: ”guys can be messy knots of feelings and fucking tender and vulnerable, too” - yes to that) and here you had two gals who just initially wanted to do it out of lust and curiosity or whatever, and that's fine - yes to that, too. It's just not what gets me going, is all. I need the goddamn feelings. Buuut okay, then we did get those in the end, technically, and I don’t know if it was actually deliberate that Marske sort of masked the undercurrents of it and what both characters were going through at first and then dived into the more profound and insightful bits more as the story unfolded, .. well fuck, maybe I just read the first part of the book through such a personal fog that I didn’t notice.
My heart was broken by Mrs. Navenby’s story, though.
The murder mystery and magical stuff were pretty ok. The plot may not have been exactly Knives Out -grade, but I found it entertaining and well-spun all the same. It also made me do some face excercises that, surroundings-wise, the book was very Titanic, what with the era and White Star Line and all. Which was ok, but felt like, why would you copy this almost exact same .. big boat, and everything in it? I get that that's what you had at the time if you wanted to travel the North Atlantic, but still. And I love the Titanic. So whatever.
Yeah so I was counting on this book to really impress me, and while it didn’t quite live up to my expectations, I’m pretty sure of my rating, all things considered. From three-ish stars to five, so a four it is!
The writing was as good as ever. Worth 5 stars. I liked how the titles of both A Marvellous Light and A Restless Truth were hinted at/brought up amidst the story just very subtly (I think it was just once), and I was all for the themes of vulnerability and layers of a person and all that. I ended up really liking both Maud and Violet, even though I wasn’t at all sure how I felt about either of them at first (and for a long time, too, after the initial nngghnghhhh). Many of the side characters I really liked, though, from beginning to end.
The romance. HmmMMHHH. Mild spoilers -->
Spoiler
I had the biggest beef with the romance up until the above-mentioned 2/3 mark, after which I was totally onboard with it. I can’t really tell if it was purely a me-thing, or if the arc of it actually was a bit.. I don’t know. I mean, it was fast and lacking in building up the chemistry between the two, for me. It started out as almost purely physical and I was silently yelling I NEED MORE EMOTION!! a lot. Some of the sex scenes (not all of them) felt more silly than hot. I kept comparing the (lack of a) spark here to that (almost perfect one) of A Marvellous Light. [more high-pitched noises and scrunchy faces here]. Also, what's with the insta-love (ok maybe it wasn't insta-insta here, technically, but it was compressed into a few days again, so) in every other book I read these days?? It only makes me go ”I NEED MORE TIME, give me the goddamn slowburn, SLOWER!!”.But yeah I also kinda appreciated how in A Marvellous Light you had two dudes and a hell of a lot more feeling and emotion (as in: ”guys can be messy knots of feelings and fucking tender and vulnerable, too” - yes to that) and here you had two gals who just initially wanted to do it out of lust and curiosity or whatever, and that's fine - yes to that, too. It's just not what gets me going, is all. I need the goddamn feelings. Buuut okay, then we did get those in the end, technically, and I don’t know if it was actually deliberate that Marske sort of masked the undercurrents of it and what both characters were going through at first and then dived into the more profound and insightful bits more as the story unfolded, .. well fuck, maybe I just read the first part of the book through such a personal fog that I didn’t notice.
My heart was broken by Mrs. Navenby’s story, though.
The murder mystery and magical stuff were pretty ok. The plot may not have been exactly Knives Out -grade, but I found it entertaining and well-spun all the same. It also made me do some face excercises that, surroundings-wise, the book was very Titanic, what with the era and White Star Line and all. Which was ok, but felt like, why would you copy this almost exact same .. big boat, and everything in it? I get that that's what you had at the time if you wanted to travel the North Atlantic, but still. And I love the Titanic. So whatever.
Yeah so I was counting on this book to really impress me, and while it didn’t quite live up to my expectations, I’m pretty sure of my rating, all things considered. From three-ish stars to five, so a four it is!