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A review by bryonie
Antiques Roadkill by Barbara Allan
1.0
Holy hell, this book was a complete slog to read. Between the absolute crazed use (or I really should say, overuse) of parentheses (seriously overused), and the almost obnoxious need to describe the clothing the main character is wearing (or trying to decide between, or populating her if-I-win-the-lottery list with) merely by naming the brand and the thing, I very nearly didn't finish this thing. It didn't make the book cute, it didn't make it quirky, it just made it sound like the author spent FAR took much time window shopping and not enough time learning the craft of how to tell a story without completely pissing off the reader.
But let's look at the characters shall we... the main character doesn't have a single redeemable or even marginally likable quality, which is rule number one for a protagonist. Brandy is shallow, materialistic, and wholly unpleasant. For no discernable reason she has completely abandoned her young son voluntarily and without remorse. In fact, is so low on her scale of priorities, what she is going to wear takes 100%of her focus while her son gets 2 very (and I do mean very) short mentions in the entire book. Not to mention the fact that her mother is mentally ill try she hasn't visited or helped in how long? Not to mention her mother lives alone still with no other outside help, which is so completely unrealistic is laughable.
Note let's talk about the story. It's apparent that the author is trying to write about things they have absolute no personal experience with. The courtroom scene is so laughably wrong it's not even remotely funny. It's as if the only court exposure the author has had its watching reruns of Night Court. There is absolutely nowhere that the events as described would ever happen no matter the level of court. EVER.
But let's look at the characters shall we... the main character doesn't have a single redeemable or even marginally likable quality, which is rule number one for a protagonist. Brandy is shallow, materialistic, and wholly unpleasant. For no discernable reason she has completely abandoned her young son voluntarily and without remorse. In fact, is so low on her scale of priorities, what she is going to wear takes 100%of her focus while her son gets 2 very (and I do mean very) short mentions in the entire book. Not to mention the fact that her mother is mentally ill try she hasn't visited or helped in how long? Not to mention her mother lives alone still with no other outside help, which is so completely unrealistic is laughable.
Note let's talk about the story. It's apparent that the author is trying to write about things they have absolute no personal experience with. The courtroom scene is so laughably wrong it's not even remotely funny. It's as if the only court exposure the author has had its watching reruns of Night Court. There is absolutely nowhere that the events as described would ever happen no matter the level of court. EVER.