aislinghelen's Reviews (1.01k)

informative tense fast-paced

I don’t feel right giving this a full review the way I usually would. This was an interesting and informative read. It was also hard, there is discussion of rape, sexual assault, fatphobia, overbearing family, racism, eating disorders, abusive relationships and probably more but those are the ones I can remember.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
funny lighthearted slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Plot
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

This was good but maybe a little long. A lot was going on but somehow most of the book was filler. I wish there had been more on the Ava stuff and more of resolution to everything else. 

I did like Rafa and Ellies relationship once the got together. They were really cute and I do love a single dad x nanny. Nico was adorable too. 

Overall, it was good but not my favourite. 3.5 Stars
informative fast-paced

Its reallly interesting but it was a bit hard to follow at points.
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

This was cute and I did enjoy it but there was a few things that made it a kind of meh read for me. 

First of all, the pacing. The pacing of the book as a whole was a bit weird; some parts were really fast, and others were slow. But the pacing of certain scenes was the bigger issue for me. There was one scene in particular that started off fairly normal, and then there was a sudden change, and everything went too fast.
This scene is when she finally has lunch with her mother after confronting her about cheating on her dad. It starts with more confrontation and she is really mad and upset with her Mom. Then suddenly, everything was fine, and she understood her mom, and they were all happy again.
 

My next big issue was everyone in her family acting like shes wrong and they know better than her. There were definitely points where she was being impulsive or she messed up. But it was never approached right, and they made a way bigger deal about other things, where she honestly wasn't wrong. 

I kind of think the side characters needed more development because they are all just centring around the MCs. The only one who really has their own plot is Rose (the bar lady, might have her name wrong) and even then its not much.

Finally (and it actually pains me to say this) there was waaaaaaay to much sex. For the majority of the book, Roman and Kylie are only fucking. They want more but they never actually talk. And yes it makes sense that there is a lot of sex since they are meant to be just hooking up but it didnt always need to be on page. I think this and the pacing thing were tied together. Adding more scenes were other things were happening would have made the pacing better and made me less overwhelmed. 

Overall, this was a cute and easy read but it felt a bit 2 dimensional.

What the F: What Swearing Reveals about Our Language, Our Brains, and Ourselves

Benjamin K. Bergen

DID NOT FINISH: 50%

This was a really interesting premise, and it could have been really good. I listened to it on audio, and the narration sucked. Either the audio quality was terrible, or the narrator had a speech impediment, but either way, I struggled to listen to it. That aside, it was boring. I love linguistics and swearing; I wrote an essay on swearing in high school. This is not a topic I should be bored by. But a lot of the information was stuff I already knew, he was just explaining research methods, or it was repeating itself. 

I don’t know how anyone could make this topic boring. But he really fucking did.

The Inmate

Freida McFadden

DID NOT FINISH: 20%

It was kind of boring and I don’t really care about finding out the plot twist

Priceless

Devyn Sinclair

DID NOT FINISH: 30%

I got an arc of this ages ago and couldn’t really get into it. I went back to try and finish it now but I can’t get through it.

Usually I love Devyn’s books. Her Slate City series is one of my all time favourites, I have reread it multiple times. But this one is just wasn’t it for me.

I know Ocean was abused but she is so insecure that I don’t want to read her POVs. Every single interaction she has with her men are about her weight. There is also no real communication between them, so she thinks they are with her for business alone and not because they actually want her. The book just felt like a really long winded lecture about her weight.

The 3 MMCs also came across the same. As in I couldn’t really tell them apart. 

I was really disappointed by this because I wanted to know Oceans story. I wanted to see everyone get the ending they deserved. But this books is just not readable to me.

Sunlight

Devney Perry

DID NOT FINISH: 60%

I wanted to love it but just couldn’t. I’m not a massive fan of accidental pregnancy but I do sometimes enjoy it. My main issue with it is that a lot of the time I don’t think the couple would actually be together if she wasn’t pregnant. And that was the case here.

Sasha did not seem ready to have a kid at all.
I mean she wouldn’t even tell people she was pregnant until she was 20 weeks and even then that was only because she didn’t want to explain that she hooked up with Jax
Jax seemed more ready and honestly more put together despite the fact that he was meant to be the less together one. I don’t think they worked as a couple. I didn’t really feel the chemistry between them, the whole thing felt forced.

It was kind of one of those books that made me question things about the author. The pregnancy and relationship came out of nowhere and the two of them choosing to keep it felt off. I know that if I kept reading things would probably magically work out but I just didn’t care enough to bother.
emotional lighthearted fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

It was good. Very cute. But the plot twist wasn’t really a twist
her dad was dead the whole time despite her constantly calling him, and she was selling her dad’s company because her ex was going to buy and destroy the ranch otherwise. She bought the ranch to sell back to West.


Honestly, as much as I enjoyed it, it felt like something was missing.