What’s Up, Everyone?
I know that I am posting two reviews back to back. I’ll try and mix it up next week, but I wanted to get a review up for this book ASAP. Truly Devious has been taking the book world by storm since it came out last month. I saw it in my library’s catalog one day and didn’t think much of it. The blurb marketed the book as a thriller, which isn’t my cup of tea. However, after reading up on the title and seeing the blurbs from John Green and E. Lockhart, I decided to pick Truly Devious up.
So far, Truly Devious seems to be getting very polarized reviews. Some reviewers thought it was a five star read. Others felt frustrated and unsatisfied. I don’t believe that I fall neatly into either camp, for while TD was fun, I did have several problems with it.
The Good: The setting, general plot and main characters
I enjoyed the setting and general plot of TD a lot. It reminded me of The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, which is a book I thoroughly enjoyed as a kid. The idea of a prestigious boarding school for talented and eccentric kids that provides students with almost limitless opportunities to explore whatever field they excel in is something that I would have applied to if it existed. Especially if it was in an awesome location like the Ellingham Mansion. The description of the grounds and the various activities that students get to participate in made me want to be a student myself. And what boarding school on the top of a mountain would be complete without a murder or two?
While I found myself preferring the current timeline, I did enjoy seeing everything that happened in 1936. The varying formats by which we receive information about the past made the first timeline seem less dull and info-dumpy. I thought, overall, the novel moved quickly and captured by attention early on. A large part of my enjoyment hinged on our main character, Stevie. I loved seeing an incredibly intelligent girl as the main character of TD. However, I also like that she wasn’t touted as being the chosen smart kid. She was surrounded by other kids who were equally as intelligent in their respective fields. I also appreciated that she did actual detective work. Sometimes characters are served clues on a silver platter and do very little work to put the pieces together. I liked that we were in Stevie’s head and got to see her follow her leads. An unexpected surprise for me was that Stevie deals with anxiety and panic disorder throughout TD. She even has a panic attack at one point during the story. Her mental health isn’t the highlight of the story, which made me appreciate the inclusion of it even more. The more mental health can be incorporated into literature, especially when it is handled gracefully, the better. Second to Stevie, Janelle and Nate were my favorite characters. I imagined Nate as Sadness from Inside Out, always being the cloud in the room. Janelle, on the other hand, was an awesome welder and craftswoman, which isn’t a career that we see women pursue frequently in literature. (Side note: While the characters are taking a tour of Ellingham in the beginning of the book, there are students of multiple faiths, races and abilities featured. Adding bonus points to TD for the inclusion of diversity in a totally normal way.)
The meh: Underdeveloped characters, unanswered questions and some strange phrases
Although there were several characters that I liked, there were also a lot of characters in TD that fell flat for me. One of the main characters that I wanted more from was Ellie. When she was first introduced, I loved how uniquely herself she was. She dyed dressed in bathtubs, unabashedly played a saxophone that she couldn’t actually play, and overall seemed like the type of person I would want to be friends with. Yet, after a while of her out of the spotlight, she started to seem a little one dimensional. She almost felt like a caricature; the zany girl who is crazier than everyone, drunker than everyone and is livelier than everyone else. Maybe if we would have had more time with her, I would have felt for her more by the end. *Fingers crossed for more character development in book two* I also didn’t care much about Hayes or the other members of his filming crew, other than Stevie and Nate.
As for the plot, the twists and reveals didn’t pay off for me in the way I thought they should. By the end, I couldn’t tell who Truly Devious was, which was frustrating. I feel like mystery books should contain enough information for the reader to be able to put the clues together themselves. I am not saying everything has to be revealed to the audience, and that there can’t be twists and turns. Rather, there should be enough evidence presented throughout the story to make the audience feel like they can solve the mystery. I didn’t feel like that at all in Truly Devious. I didn’t feel like I had enough the pieces to even get close to narrowing down suspects. Most of the reveals for the Truly Devious murder happen at the end of the novel, but they are vague and reference a sliver of clues that were revealed over the course of the novel. I also have so many unanswered questions about the Ellingham murders, many of which I don’t think will ever be answered. For instance, was there something going on with Mrs. Robinson and Mrs. Ellingham? What was going on with Mrs. Robinson and Leonard Nair? They mentioned something they were doing, but there wasn’t any pay off to that thread. Also, what did Mrs. Robinson take from Mrs. Ellingham’s room? I wish that there would have been more concrete evidence provided to us for the Ellingham case, in the same way the evidence was collected for Hayes's case. I feel like the payoff would have been greater if I felt like I had some solid suspects, rather than vague clues.
Finally, some of the sentences of Truly Devious were just strangely written. The one that sticks out the most to me is on page 42, when Stevie sees Hayes for the first time.
“He looked toned all over, but his calves were particularly so. His calves, in fact, had outgrown the rest of him. Beefy calves.”
The Bad: Unnecessary romance and poor editing
First off, I don’t know if I can even call what happened between Stevie and David a romance. It is more of an off handed make out session and sequential fall out. The romance doesn’t add anything to the plot. In fact, I think it detracts from it. David’s character just seems to be in the picture so that Stevie has someone to crush on. He also seems to be strange for strange’s sake, and for the big reveal at the end. There is some tension between them that drives part of the plot along, but it isn’t resolved in a way that is healthy (or that really resolves anything). However, Stevie seems unnaturally attracted to David. I would have loved for Stevie to be Ace, rather than be into David. I think that it would have been great representation, and also fit Stevie’s overall character very well.
My major complaint with Truly Devious is that it is poorly edited. Now, I am not an editor. I haven’t gone to school for years to edit work for a living. I also understand that no one is perfect, and that it is common for at least one error to appear in a book every once in a while. However, the mistakes in Truly Devious that I found were glaringly obvious, like the final edition I was reading was somehow an uncorrected proof copy that accidentally got printed.
Here are all the examples that I could find:
Page 71. There should be a quotation mark after “Charles said”.
Original:
“Oh my God,” Nate mumbled under his breath.
“As you’re at the end of your tour,” Charles said, we need to say a word about Alice. Alice Ellingham was the daughter of our founder, Albert Ellingham.”
Correction:
“As you’re at the end of your tour,” Charles said,“we need to say a word about Alice. Alice Ellingham was the daughter of our founder, Albert Ellingham.”
Page 259. Quotation mark missing
Original:
Stevie needed to master this look. This was what a detective looked like.
I’m going to record this,” she said, putting a digital recorder down on the small Art Deco table between them. “Interview between Stephanie Bell and Detective Fatima…
Correction:
Stevie needed to master this look. This was what a detective looked like.
“I’m going to record this,” she said, putting a digital recorder down on the small Art Deco table between them. “Interview between Stephanie Bell and Detective Fatima...
Page 363. Incomplete sentence.
Original:
This is why no one found Dottie and Iris until it was too late. The days dragged on. If someone had called the police that night. Maybe it would have all been different for the Ellinghams. But they didn’t.
Correction:
This is why no one found Dottie and Iris until it was too late. The days dragged on. If someone had called the police that night, maybe it would have all been different for the Ellinghams. But they didn’t.
These problems with editing bothered me a lot, especially because they were easy to spot and even easier to fix. Hopefully I am not the only one who noticed them and they will be fixed in future printings.
Overall, Truly Devious was a lot of fun. It was an incredibly quick read that had an interesting story line and some fun characters. I’d recommend it to anyone who is a fan of Sherlock, The Mysterious Benedict Society, or mysteries in general. I also feel like it would be a great read if you are trying to get out of a reading slump. Despite all the problems I had with it, I do plan on picking up the second book. However, it wasn’t the five star read that I was hoping it would be.
Rating:
4 stars out of 5
80% out of 100%
-Jaime