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A review by jorgechachas
Verity by Colleen Hoover
3.0
I might be jaded from my endless search for horrific medium, but I don't believe this novel to be as terrifying as the vast majority of people made it out to be. Not to say that it was an easy read through-and-through, but once the plot was properly established practically nothing came of surprise (save for the final chapter which I'll get to).
Hoover is honestly a good writer, because I swallowed (no pun intended) this book in two sittings over a weekend. Right from the get-go I was interested in Lowen and her life (btw, really dumb names is a trend in this book). I understood her hesitations and her development seemed natural through the story. Same goes for Jeremy.
But let me get into some of my issues, which of there are three big ones:
Firstly - I should've read the bottom of the summary text where this book was clearly labeled as "Romantic Thriller" because in the hype created by this release I wasn't made aware of how much of this was just constant detailed sex scenes. I mean, they're all nicely written, but I truly wish all of those pages going into deep explanations would've instead been used to further develop the actual plot. We get it, Jeremy lays mad pipe, good for them.
Secondly - The novel is amazingly paced for the most part, but decides without warning to free fall at ludicrous speeds through the finale. There was so much potential to build on distrust, suspense, the undoing of multiple relationships, and to put the characters' own sanity and safety into bigger more significant question.
Lastly (mild/very general spoilers for the extra sensitive) - The final chapter of the book introduces unnecessary ambiguity that takes away from the suspense built through the previous 300 pages. It also opens up additional questions that don't inspire analysis, but rather "well then X doesn't make any sense." Now, because of these 10ish pages, the book has annoying plot-holes. I understand that the purpose might be to have the reader second guess everything, but at least for me it comes off as pretty straight-forward.
I'm feeling a 6 to 6.5/10. Enjoyable. Not a must-read. Not enough to make me interested in Hoover's other work unfortunately (also to be fair, I believe she focuses on Romance, which I am fully uninterested in).
Hoover is honestly a good writer, because I swallowed (no pun intended) this book in two sittings over a weekend. Right from the get-go I was interested in Lowen and her life (btw, really dumb names is a trend in this book). I understood her hesitations and her development seemed natural through the story. Same goes for Jeremy.
But let me get into some of my issues, which of there are three big ones:
Firstly - I should've read the bottom of the summary text where this book was clearly labeled as "Romantic Thriller" because in the hype created by this release I wasn't made aware of how much of this was just constant detailed sex scenes. I mean, they're all nicely written, but I truly wish all of those pages going into deep explanations would've instead been used to further develop the actual plot. We get it, Jeremy lays mad pipe, good for them.
Secondly - The novel is amazingly paced for the most part, but decides without warning to free fall at ludicrous speeds through the finale. There was so much potential to build on distrust, suspense, the undoing of multiple relationships, and to put the characters' own sanity and safety into bigger more significant question.
Lastly (mild/very general spoilers for the extra sensitive) - The final chapter of the book introduces unnecessary ambiguity that takes away from the suspense built through the previous 300 pages. It also opens up additional questions that don't inspire analysis, but rather "well then X doesn't make any sense." Now, because of these 10ish pages, the book has annoying plot-holes. I understand that the purpose might be to have the reader second guess everything, but at least for me it comes off as pretty straight-forward.
I'm feeling a 6 to 6.5/10. Enjoyable. Not a must-read. Not enough to make me interested in Hoover's other work unfortunately (also to be fair, I believe she focuses on Romance, which I am fully uninterested in).