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ellemnope 's review for:
Nothing But Blackened Teeth
by Cassandra Khaw
dark
informative
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
2.5 stars.
I'm so sad about this one. The premise was golden, the cover is beautiful, it had so much promise. But it just wasn't fleshed out enough to stand solid. The writing is good, though laced with a lot of Asian culture that I was unfamiliar with. I actually liked this because I was able to do some research and learn about the Heian era and honestly found it quite interesting. But the book alone didn't do enough for me.
The characters are all very unlikable. That's fine honestly, as long as I can see reason in it and follow a pathway of a logical plot that explores their personalities and relationships. Nothing But Blackened Teeth scraped the surface on this. The reader is dropped right into an already moving plot without a lot of backstory about the characters or how they relate to one another. This is revealed in snippets along the way, but not in a way that really gives the characters enough body. All that I really gleaned from it is that they seem to generally dislike one another, or at least have a fairly solid apathy toward the whole situation. A majority of the characters are selfish and egocentric in a way that just irritated the crap out of me.
I could have overlooked my issues with the characters and taken them in as a pivotal part of the story, but the book didn't grip me enough to make me care. The atmosphere is there, but not as powerful as I would have liked. There is a lot of telling instead of showing and I think there were a lot of missed opportunities for totally creepy and tense scenes. Instead, they kind of get swept over and, as a result, I just didn't care. I was waiting for the gripping moment. And when it came, thought it was well-written and conceived, it fell flat for me.
I needed this to be longer and more fleshed out. I needed to see more instead of just being fed information. I needed more description, more atmosphere, and more tension. The bones are there, but this felt more like a pitch than a finished tale. Like I got the middle chunk of a rough draft and there was still more work to do. I'm bummed.
* Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. *
I'm so sad about this one. The premise was golden, the cover is beautiful, it had so much promise. But it just wasn't fleshed out enough to stand solid. The writing is good, though laced with a lot of Asian culture that I was unfamiliar with. I actually liked this because I was able to do some research and learn about the Heian era and honestly found it quite interesting. But the book alone didn't do enough for me.
The characters are all very unlikable. That's fine honestly, as long as I can see reason in it and follow a pathway of a logical plot that explores their personalities and relationships. Nothing But Blackened Teeth scraped the surface on this. The reader is dropped right into an already moving plot without a lot of backstory about the characters or how they relate to one another. This is revealed in snippets along the way, but not in a way that really gives the characters enough body. All that I really gleaned from it is that they seem to generally dislike one another, or at least have a fairly solid apathy toward the whole situation. A majority of the characters are selfish and egocentric in a way that just irritated the crap out of me.
I could have overlooked my issues with the characters and taken them in as a pivotal part of the story, but the book didn't grip me enough to make me care. The atmosphere is there, but not as powerful as I would have liked. There is a lot of telling instead of showing and I think there were a lot of missed opportunities for totally creepy and tense scenes. Instead, they kind of get swept over and, as a result, I just didn't care. I was waiting for the gripping moment. And when it came, thought it was well-written and conceived, it fell flat for me.
I needed this to be longer and more fleshed out. I needed to see more instead of just being fed information. I needed more description, more atmosphere, and more tension. The bones are there, but this felt more like a pitch than a finished tale. Like I got the middle chunk of a rough draft and there was still more work to do. I'm bummed.
* Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. *