Scan barcode
A review by imme_van_gorp
Love/Hate by Quinn Riley
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
Oh my god, this was awful. It felt like it was written by a 14-year old girl who didn’t even bother to check whether any of her writing made a lick of sense before publishing it. The sentences had no structure whatsoever, the plot gave me whiplash, and the characters were as ridiculously unbelievable as possible.
The romance had to be the most random and underdeveloped thing I’ve ever encountered; it’s a bully romance, but the book starts with the bully being halfway in love with his victim from the get-go, so the very first time we see them interact he says “sorry”, they hook up, and start a relationship. This all happened in the first damn pages, and it was simply insane.
Anyway, after I’d read about 20% of this book I knew it was utter trash, so I decided to skim the rest of it. I’ll just recap the gist of the plot, because wow, it was so dumb and I feel like people need to know just how dumb it is before choosing to waste their time on it:
Okay, so the book starts with the arsehole bully having an epiphany about lusting after the guy he’s tormented for years, so he decides to have some sort of hate make-out session with him (which the victim was totally okay with for some reason?), and then they immediately start dating and talking about love. It was super random and had no build-up. However, it gets worse, because some big “misunderstanding” happens that has the victim running away for five years, which leads to the bully being all pissy and angry at him (hypocrisy is a foreign concept for him, I guess). Anyway, this means that after the victim comes back he spends the whole rest of the book groveling and trying to win the bully back. Like… excuse me!? You’re telling me the bully gave his victim severe anxiety, OCD and dissociative disorder with his abuse, but the book decides to focus on the grovel the VICTIM gives to the bully? A grovel we NEVER got from the bully in the first place?? And the victim has to grovel for leaving for <i>very valid reasons</i>, because who can blame the guy for not assuming the best about his abusive bully when everyone tells him horrible lies about what the bully was planning to do to him?? I’d have left too! Well, I’d never have forgiven the bully in the first place, so the whole point is moot, but still. Just… What a mess. So frustrating.
P.S. The victim’s dad casually ended up dating and impregnating his recently legal son’s closest friend, which was totally accepted by everyone and the dad was considered the <i>good guy</i> in this story. I feel like that should tell you all you need to know about the quality of this book and the decency of the characters.
The romance had to be the most random and underdeveloped thing I’ve ever encountered; it’s a bully romance, but the book starts with the bully being halfway in love with his victim from the get-go, so the very first time we see them interact he says “sorry”, they hook up, and start a relationship. This all happened in the first damn pages, and it was simply insane.
Anyway, after I’d read about 20% of this book I knew it was utter trash, so I decided to skim the rest of it. I’ll just recap the gist of the plot, because wow, it was so dumb and I feel like people need to know just how dumb it is before choosing to waste their time on it:
Okay, so the book starts with the arsehole bully having an epiphany about lusting after the guy he’s tormented for years, so he decides to have some sort of hate make-out session with him (which the victim was totally okay with for some reason?), and then they immediately start dating and talking about love. It was super random and had no build-up. However, it gets worse, because some big “misunderstanding” happens that has the victim running away for five years, which leads to the bully being all pissy and angry at him (hypocrisy is a foreign concept for him, I guess). Anyway, this means that after the victim comes back he spends the whole rest of the book groveling and trying to win the bully back. Like… excuse me!? You’re telling me the bully gave his victim severe anxiety, OCD and dissociative disorder with his abuse, but the book decides to focus on the grovel the VICTIM gives to the bully? A grovel we NEVER got from the bully in the first place?? And the victim has to grovel for leaving for <i>very valid reasons</i>, because who can blame the guy for not assuming the best about his abusive bully when everyone tells him horrible lies about what the bully was planning to do to him?? I’d have left too! Well, I’d never have forgiven the bully in the first place, so the whole point is moot, but still. Just… What a mess. So frustrating.
P.S. The victim’s dad casually ended up dating and impregnating his recently legal son’s closest friend, which was totally accepted by everyone and the dad was considered the <i>good guy</i> in this story. I feel like that should tell you all you need to know about the quality of this book and the decency of the characters.