Hello Everyone!
I received an ARC from NetGalley in return for an honest review. Due to problems with my reading software, I was not able to read this book until now. My apologies, this problem has been solved. Overview (Non-Spoliery Section) This book was an intense read and if you saw the blurb from Gillian Flynn, I am expecting you were desiring a book like this. I really enjoyed parts of our narrator, Ani. She was strong and didn’t mind speaking her mind. It was nice to this type of female protagonist in the book. However, there were many times where she got on my nerves (more about that in the Spoliery Section). I haven’t read many Thriller novels, but author Jessica Knoll serves up a solid addition to this genre. For this the book deserves three stars. However… ***Spoilers*** I was very frustrated for a significant period of time while reading this book. Ani is solid during some points of the book, which makes the some of her annoyance bearable. But in truth, I really didn’t care about any of the characters in this book, and the view of Ani in the present and the past didn’t make me have any more sympathy for her. Part 1 of her big backstory is rape. She got gang rapped when she was in high school and proceeded to tell… no one. Absolutely 0 people. She gets totally wasted with a group of the “in crowd” at her new school, gets gang raped and tells no one because Ani is in such dire straights to become “popular” and “reinvent” herself that she completely destroys herself in the process. Knoll spends a good page describing the experience that Ani wants to have when she loses her virginity and then proceeds to write her character into a situation where that decision gets ripped away from her. And she does nothing! She has a supportive group of friends too. It isn’t like she showed up at her new school and was a complete loner. Nope. Even when she has these friends around her to ask/receive advice from her completely disregards their opinion because of her desire to be on top. Flash forward and she is about to be on top, finally, in her career, writing as a (you could basically guess this) a sex columnist! Irony is a total turd sometimes. In the end, she doesn’t get married, it is revealed that the rapists get brutally murdered and one of the rapists, which is now an author, gives this 28 year old an apology. I have problems with this: 1) If Ani would have gone to the police or her parents or basically anyone at this point, she would have had some hard justice thrown at her rapists. The police are on her side! 2) Point 1 doesn’t happen 3) Her rapists are therefore brutally murdered! They are freaking 14 year olds! Police justice and hard time are one thing but because you didn’t speak (and again, I would like to repeat that this is not one of those “she couldn’t” situations, Ani straight but didn’t do it because she was seeking popularity) murder is not the next best option. For the author, it felt like a stretch for a simple, over the top thrill. 4) In her present, an apology is not enough. Really. She stuffed this for years and you think that an apology is totally going to fix what you did to a 14 year old girl. This needed to happen years ago. Were there morals? Nope. I have no idea if there were any solid ethical points throughout this book.
This might be for you. It is a Thriller and if you like those sort of things, I would be like “for all intents and purposes you should give this a try.” But I am telling you know, you might want to look into Gillian Flynn rather than a book she blurbed.
Overall:
2 out of 5 Stars
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