It's hard for me to really rate this book because while I didn't hate it, I didn't like it. I don't know if it is that I don't necessarily understand or enjoy stories about forgiving shitty family members or if it is because I don't understand what I'm supposed to get out of this, but it just didn't work for me. Well, this is not entirely true, the 1/3 of the book worked for me and after that I just didn't. I liked the writing style and I liked most of the plot it is just that overall the story doesn't hit for me. I feels like the author had two semi related stories and some extra bits and snitched them all together with various levels of success.  Not a winner from my POV.

Oh this was so much fun! I mean just so much fun. It reminds me so much of Good Omens just in the vibe and the humor. I guess this is just the year that I read about Necromancers and have a great time doing it between this and the Locked Tomb series. This book sounds so serious from the description but it is full of heart. I love assholes characters who secretly have a heart, I love the sort of twisty-turny way the plot goes about itself. I love the growth and the tension and I just wanna eat this book directly up. I can't wait to read more of them. 

I'm having really hard luck with my reading slump. It's been a minute since I've read a great one (besides the Frankenstein reread I just did). I was hoping this would cure me but. Alas. This book just didn't work for me. Maybe it was that I lost count of how many times someone pissed/shat their pants or maybe it was the weaving in and out of time or maybe it was that there were too many stories happening. It could just have been that the story wasn't right for me. There was potential in this, I just didn't think it worked overly well. I didn't hate it, it's a solid three, I just didn't really... like it very much, Maybe it should be a two but I really don't think it elicited enough in me to make me dislike it enough for a two rating.

So. Here's the thing. I just don't entirely Get the point of view of the main character. Like, I understand some of his motivation and I get a lot of what the story is saying but there's so many times when the lead character does things that simply do not make sense to me. Maybe it's because it is so short or maybe it's the nature of being a book in verse but this just didn't work for me. The other problem is that the minor characters seem pretty two dimensional and things just sort of work out in a really weird way.  Additionally this got pretty weird about religion in general, I'm not gonna lie. Overall this book just didn't do it for me at all.

So let me start by saying this is a very hard book to read. Like it is such a great book and I think it is very necessary book but it is like a punch in the gut every chapter. To talk about this book is to spoil it but let me just say that the book has trigger warnings in the front and I would ask you all to take them extremely seriously as this book is basically one long terrible tragedy heaped upon a young black woman. Read with care, please.

I think it is important to understand how much this book feels like sitting in your friends house as they get out their journal from high school and read it to you. Some of it is very serious and very deep but most of it is I think intentionally not to be taken seriously. The last half in particular is very serious and thoughtful writing while the beginning is not that. I think the reason for the low rating is that I don't always love the emotional whiplash that comes with two very different kinds of poems/stories. I think the parts that hit really did so and had a great impact and I'm happy to sort of chuckle at the tongue in cheek stuff but not both in such a short book.

I mean... maybe this just wasn't the right time for me and this book (I started reading it the day of the 2020 US elections so.... STRESS). I was excited about this book, I thought it could have been great. Instead it just helped me continue my book slump. This book is thematically about what you'd expect and the trigger warnings are all pretty obvious if you read the description of the book. I felt like the characters were pretty flat and the writing style was really not for me. I know I'm well in the minority with regards to this book and maybe someday I can revisit it and I'll find it more enjoyable. But as it stands, I can't say I enjoyed it.

I've been thinking about this book since I finished it yesterday. I was trying to decided what it was that didn't work. It had lots of elements that I should enjoy: the horror aspect, the private school aspect, Queer women, (SPOILER) poly relationships. But despite all of these things that could have been used to make a great story, instead what we get is... this. For starters I simple do not understand how these characters would want to spend any time together after what happens. The twists in this novel don't hit, I'm not even sure what themes I'm supposed to take away from it. This is an absolute brick of a novel and it had so much it could be, so much it could say, and instead it just... falls completely flat.

This is just... too unrealistic from the beginning. I really am so picky re: teen thrillers and this one was just.. not there.

Yeah, no, I'm done with this series. I don't have the energy to talk about this book in any meaningful way I'm just totally over it. This is no longer fun, the story isn't engaging, and I am too busy rolling my eyes at every other page to get anything out of it.