clovetra's Reviews (262)

this was heartbreaking. to begin with, i wasn’t sold on this book, but the more i read, the more i became invested and felt both melancholy and serenity.

i really can’t explain why this book enthralled me so much. the writing was superb, but although the protagonist lacked characterisation beyond her motivations, i was rooting for her.

usually when i review a book or contemplate my thoughts surrounding it, i like to break down my thoughts based on the writing, the plot, the characters, and how it made me feel emotionally. but this book is the first that is difficult to explain why it evoked such deep emotions in me. maybe because i can relate to the protagonist, who feels as though she is meandering her whole life. maybe it’s because i wanted to see if she would find civilisation, and how the book ends. or maybe this book is enigmatic and truly sits in its own field. i can’t say a single book ive read comes close to this one in terms of its plot & deeper themes. it is in a genre of its own, floating around on bookshelves, just like the protagonist.

i’m going to keep this review incredibly brief.

this anthology had a beautiful message, but her style didn’t resonate with me. i am not a fan of stream-of-consciousness poetry, but the story’s araluen told are important and need to be told.

idk how to feel about this book. honestly i think im becoming a bit… disillusioned with greek mythology retellings at the moment. i honestly think they swing big and either really succeed or meander. and i would say this book follows the later.

i really couldn’t connect with this book at all. the ending felt rushed, and after the minotaur story was completed, the story felt as if it was floundering. obviously the entire book can’t be about life at crete but the fact it barely even covered 100 pages really let this book down. 

ariadne was at best a blank slate to narrate the tales of dionysus, and at worst was incredibly boring and annoying. i understand her naivety is fundamental to her story but it was overdone 200 pages in, and by the end i was over her.

phaedra was kind of likeable i guess. i enjoyed her at the beginning, but as soon as her story moved to her & hippolyta, she became insufferable. seriously when

her & ariadne were fighting over hippolyta

i didn’t agree with either of them. her ending also felt rushed and she lacked any depth being her impulsivity and brash nature.

dionysus was boring as well. he seemed to be all over the place with his characterisation, and his ending felt like it against everything earlier set up in the book. i get that was kind of the point but from a reader’s perspective it’s just a tad stupid.

i also think i became disillusioned with saint’s writing style by the end. to begin with i loved her descriptions and her poetic way of writing, but after the 20th sentence telling us that women always pay the price for a man’s crime i was over it. this book felt like it was going in circles constantly.

now you might ask - why did i finish this? because i own a copy of this, and i was curious to see if it could redeem itself the more it progressed. i don’t like to DNF books i own - if its a library or ebook sure she’s going in the DNF pile. but i paid $26 for this i was finishing it either way. and yet why didn’t i give this a 1-star? because i was still curious to see where this went. i wasn’t invested in the characters but i was invested in where things would go. 

idk i don’t think i had too much fun reading this. the beginning was intriguing, but after ariadne’s arrival at noxus the book fizzled away. and also the ending was dumb, anticlimatic and yet again rushed.

i will defo be taking a break from retellings for a while after this one!

i am sat here fucking CRYING. this is the first book i can say ive read in one sitting and. wow. holy fuck. 6th book i’ve read in my lifetime to make me cry 👍

i don’t know why this book had such an effect on me. i don’t know why the ending made me so distraught. this whole book made me distraught.

i gobbled this book UP. i went in with low expectations and my god were they blown away. 

this is the most buckwild book i’ve ever read. the synopsis on storygraph does NOT do this book justice at all. this book has so much personality oozing out of the pages i want to almost reread it again. right now.

god i loved piranesi (the character). he was so enamoured by everything & his dialogue was so funny yet endearing. i like that we as readers learn information with piranesi, and idk the ending is incredibly sweet. 

honestly for the first 20 pages i was like “hey what the fuck am i reading” but honestly after that i was enthralled. ass? sat. holy FUCK

sorry i actually cannot put into words how insane this book was and how much of a fun time i had reading this. although at times i did feel like i was losing my mind because i was so fucking confused, after a while i got the hang of what was going on (aka i looked up an explanation and realised no im not dumb this book is actually just fucking bonkers). but honestly the confusion made this book fun!!! interesting!!! i had no idea what was going to happen next!!!!

i’m actually going to now go & stare at fanart of piranesi happy with the albatrosses and fall asleep thinking of myself in the halls.

i’m actually quite surprised by how much fun i had with this. 

this book automatically gets a bonus point from me because, not to toot my own horn, but i’m usually great at picking the culprit in mystery novels. this one? i had no clue! and it wasn’t even because i wasn’t trying to work it out & was just along for the ride. nope i was trying my hardest! but if a book can blindside me regarding its culprit yet have it still make sense? yeah immediately a great book in my mind.

the only reason i don’t see this as a 5-star is that im still a tad confused at how the “murders” occurred based on the culprit, but hey i might reread this a bit in the future to see if i can see the signs. i won’t lie the ending did confuse me a bit as well… im gonna have to google what actually was being conveyed in the epilogue because honestly im lost.

also there is a little ding in my mind for

both the women being killed so early on :( i mean i get why! and they would’ve died anyways so like does it really matter when it is? but to me yes it does because theres literally like 6 female characters & 5 of them are dead (the last female character literally is irrelevant so).

but like i said this is a minor ding this didn’t ruin the book for me.

i really enjoyed the characters as well as the setting. shout out to my homies agatha & poe. this is my first proper “locked in” mystery and honestly i had a blast! i loved this book and im 100% going to be reading ayatsuji’s other stories TRUST

you know how you can easily tell if i’m not gonna like a book? if it takes me 2 months to finish a 386 page book. i do not get the hype around this book. 

i mean i didn’t hate this!!! it was a perfectly fine book. nothing more than that for me honestly.

i could kind of feel for elizabeth? like yes relatable feminism type of beat. but idk man the book felt so monotone the entire time because she herself is so monotone! i mean i love a bad bitch who likes chemistry but idk she felt incredibly one dimensional. like why did the fucking dog interest me more than the main character. anyways shout out six-thirty he’s a real one.

well what else is there to say? the plot just seemed to read like a biography & ended at a super odd place imo. like the way this book was formatted i was here thinking it would end with mad becoming a chemist or elizabeth dying or something and then it just…. stopped randomly. like why was that point chosen to end the story?? but honestly i wouldn’t have cared if it kept going because i actually didn’t give a shit about any character except the dog. THE DOG!

idk based on the hype this book has & the fact it has its own tv show…. i expected More. this was a really odd book. but i mean i finished it. i had a decent time. i like the overall message & the chemistry themes. other than that tho…… this is not for me. honestly it felt like a waste of time. i mean not every book needs a “message”, but when i don’t give a flying fart about ur characters ANNNDDD ur book said nothing new. yawn 

ok the argument can be made this book is about found family. but for what this book was most of the time, it did not succeed in satisfying me. 

i feel like im being demonic in writing this review but i promise im only this scathing when its a popular book sorry i’d self combust if i was this mean to a book with <100,000 reviews. but luckily this book is popular so i don’t feel bad for dunking on it! 

i think the reason im so “disappointed” in this book is because of its hype. it’s a perfectly tolerable book, with what i will admit to be some funny dialogue, but the plot felt all over the place, was uninteresting, and imo never actually interested me. i’m so serious i only picked up this book just so i could finish it. for a while i was a tad invested in mad, but at some point i think i stopped caring & just wanted to finish it because i own this book (i mean not after today you best believe im donating this sorry my shelf space is for all time faves). 

anyways i will say this book DID excite me for my next neuroscience class next semester LETS GOOOO

thank you NetGalley & Peachtree Teens for providing me with an ARC of this book!!!! babies first ARC who cheered. anyways. i dont know why but once i finished this book i was crying. i was a mess. i was on the fence whether i was going to give this a 3-star or 4-star rating but i believe if a book can immerse me that well it deserves an additional star.
the novel follows miles abernathy, certified proud socialist, redneck, and trans kid just trying to get by in a town where his family name is mud. his lineage also follows some certified badasses, namely saint abernathy, who was also a socialist. abernathy’s get treated like dirt in twist creek, namely by the resident asshole, sherriff davies, who has lied, stole & killed to keep his position. we follow miles as he Fucks Shit Up, and becomes entangled in seeking revenge for himself and all those wronged by the davies family.

let me start off with what i absolutely adored;

the way ajw uses chapter-formatting to his advantage is on full display here. every chapter starting off as a black page is feeding into my love of books with “mixed media”, and im a sucker for one-paragraph chapters. 

the characterisation of the main antagonist of this story, sheriff davies? chefs kiss. impeccable. ajw NEVER fails to make his villains menacing, and i know whenever im reading an ajw book im in for a TREAT in the villain department. ugh theyre always so well written. you know where else ajw doesnt miss? when writing about being trans & autistic. i love that that is ajw’s “calling card” in his books, and yet again as an autistic & nonbinary person, the descriptions were very true to reality. i also really adored the brief touching on what it means to be afab & autistic, and how we are often underdiagnosed. 

this story reminded me a lot of heathers (1988), both tonally and at some plot points. im not mad at that at all god that movie is a masterpiece. but i do think there are many differences between both stories to not completely conclude “oh yeah this book is an adapted retelling”, but i will say the “heathers” elements of this book SLAPPED. 

the overall story did take a while to get started, which i think is a bit of a flaw. when it got going, this book was GOOOODDD. eat it for breakfast lunch and dinner. but it took more than half of the pages for the plot to really entice me. compared to ajw’s other stories, i’ll say this one took the ‘longest’ to really pick up its pace. 

i think one minor slip with this book’s fundamental story is regarding setting it in a time period. the story gives the vibe of a country-western movie (ive never watched one), and although yeah its quite obvious once reading what the time period is based on things like phones, references, etc. but… i dont know hearing about contemporary events in this book was incredibly jarring. this brings me to a bigger issue - i will say i am also a socialist. do not mistake what i am about to say as me disagreeing with the points raised. but there are paragraphs throughout this book that include what seem to be think-pieces about socialism, police, communism, capitalism, etc. all fine and dandy, but the way they were written and how they were woven into the story and dialogue itself felt clumsy. one minute we’d be talking about miles’ opinion on something going on in the town itself, and then it would move on to an overall opinion of how the world works. i dont know how else to properly to describe what exactly im referring to without spoiling the story, but i will say it felt a bit… awkward. this issue of clunky dialogue extended to any dialogue about a character being lgbt+ and/or disabled. let me also preface, i am all of these things! i am autistic, a nonbinary lesbian & physically disabled. i promise i am not saying this because i am ableist or homophobic or transphobic. but, yet again, any dialogue regarding a character being autistic, or having physical deformities, or discovering their identity, was so fucking heavy-handed. for example, there is a line of dialogue, word for word, “I know they’re a they – it’s hard to miss the Suck my they/them dick pin”. or for another example, “I mean, [redacted name for no spoilers] didn’t know [pronoun] was being threatened, the autism will do that”. there is a whoooole bunch of dialogue like this, and im sorry every time i saw it i wanted to cry. because this book was so good but im so serious dialogue like that reminds me of fan fiction and i just cant do it man. im all for representation, theres so much in this book!!!!! and none of the actual representation itself feels forced, its just the way these “quirks” (as so written in the book dont @ me) are divulged to the reader feel so amateurish compared to what i am used to, just coming off finishing what i am calling his magnum opus, the spirit bares its teeth. 

i just realised i havent actually yapped about how much i love the characters so heres a quick rundown -

i really wasnt invested in what happened to miles up until about the halfway mark, which is concerningly long but by the end i was fully having adrenaline spikes and crying cuz i was worried for my boy. happy to see a physically disabled & autistic character - bro thats literally me. i think this may have been why i was crying, because finally representation of me exists :’). love dallas, they’re a bad ass bitch and i loved them candidly explaining there is no degree of disability to be considered disabled - a few scars vs full disfigurement, we are all the same. miles’ parents ate, as did his grandparents. obv i hated the antagonists, and actively was gobsmacked when paul was killed. cooper was a shit head & deserved what he got, but i do feel bad for his dad :( im also very pleased that there was no animal cruelty because my god if there was i would not have survived i think.

all in all, although there are a few imperfections with this book, honestly, i had a good time! by the end i was fully devouring this book, and i need art of miles this minute.

anyways if you wondered what heathers the musical would be like if it was canonically filled with awesome lgbt+ and disabled representation set in a contemporary period, this book is for you!  

okkkk work! this is my first retelling ive read (that isn’t greek mythology mind you) and ngl i had a good time!

this review will be short as this was literally like 150 pages. short & sweet

i really liked the main character! i think creating a bunch of new pronouns & having the mc not only be nonbinary but use xenopronouns was super interesting.

the story at times felt like it was stagnant and at other times (mainly the end) it was moving too fast, but it’s such a short story idk how this could have been “worked around”.

the ending was intriguing yet lowkey kinda cool? this was a very interesting book in terms of body horror. i’m always drawn to book that include nature in their horror themes, but tbh i think this book is the first ive read to actually “succeed” at this goal.

what else can i say? madeline was really cool esp in the end. miss potter is also a bad bitch and i love her.

idk what else to say except im excited to see where this goes in the next instalment! 

honestly i dont really know what to say about this. this is the most average book ive read. somehow disinterested and curious about the book.
perseus was insufferable for the entire book, which was difficult as he's lowkey the main character. yeah thats the goal of this book but idk i wanted to deck him more than i loved the main characters.
danae was... fine. her beginning was super interesting, and then her story teetered out. andromeda was also interesting to begin with, but by the end she lost all her characterisation. that was probably intentional but it does make for a super boring story when i hate one main character & dont care about the other.
i really liked medusa's story. it was the shortest yet the best. im still confused about if in this retelling if she actually had snakes for hair? or she just liked snakes? i know about the gorgon bit but... idk. she was the best but she still wasnt great, as yet again she just felt like a plot device.
idk this book was fine. i dont think it achieved the feat of being a "feminist retelling" of perseus, as all the female characters just existed to drive the story. yes theres probably a deeper commentary about how perseus objectifies women and this is expressed in their significance within the book but.. i dont care if a book has a deeper meaning if i dont find the book interesting its complexity literally means nothing to me.
like i said, this feels like an average book. this is like a movie you'd go and see because your voucher expires tomorrow & this is all that has seats left, yknow?

god this book had such potential!! and sadly it did not live up to it. this book's pacing was so odd, and coupled with the fact the actual "mystery" was only explained >80% into this book was a bit.... eyebrow raising.
i will say i liked iris, she was a good protag. kinda was a blank slate but i think that was her role.
vivi can have my soul esp since she seems to love hungarian women. vivi hmu i can show u my grandma's village we can get it on queen. sorry i love a bald lesbian who also is down with the magyars 🔥
grey was... idk. i still cant put my finger on my opinion of her. i mean she was... fine. with how big her role was for this story though... she was a bit of a let down. especially since for like 90% of this book she spoke in cryptic phrases that actually just pissed me off. at some point i want to be reading this book because im invested in the characters, not just that i want them to shut up and stop saying vague terms to actually explain the whole mystery element of this story. like by the end, this book became so interesting! but when i only find the last fourth of your book intriguing......
like

the fact the girls were changelings all along? and killed the real hollow sisters? the dad was the bull (which ngl was predictable but its YA so im not gonna be too harsh on that)? cate knew they were changelings??? tyler had his fucking SKIN REMOVED AND WORN LIKE A SUIT????????

was so good! if the whole book was that i wouldve easily given this 4/5 stars. but when most of ur book is building up to a reveal that doesnt come until the very very end and then almost NOTHING is done with the reveal?????? nawwww
also sorry the minute i read

iris kissed tyler

this book became a chop. sorry i cant fucking stand the

a relative of a missing person & the missing person's partner kiss because they share such a deep love for said missing person

trope. not to mention

iris is 17 and tyler is fucking 20!!!!!!! EW AGE GAP

.
i think a lot of these "issues" i have with this book can be attributed to its YA nature but some... like literally i love the premise i just wished it was executed better. like this book had some great parts! the opening chapters were quite good ngl, as were the final 4 chapters. but everything in the middle? it was not enjoyable for me im afraid. idk i think the concepts explored at the end deserved some more run time, with the whole "ooo where's grey" schtick being shorter as to expand those concepts. i mean for me personally im not saying change the entire book just for little old me 😭 but you know? great concept, missed the mark more often than it probably should have.
also sorry i feel like the "horror" elements were all mish-mashed together. like the flower stuff... the fucky-ass ending with the bull? like idk it reminded me a lot of You're Not Supposed to Die Tonight & She Is a Haunting but idk like those books this felt..... like it was missing multiple puzzle pieces.