jellybeexo's Reviews (450)

Dr. Frederik Starks is a psychoanalyst living in New York. On his 53rd birthday he recieves a letter by “Rumplestiltzkin” stating that Dr. Starks ruined his life and
to be punished for it he has 15 days to uncover Rumplestiltzkin’s identity
or commit suicide. If he fails to do
so, Rumpelstilizken will destroy the life of one of Dr. Stark's family members.

Being interested in psychology, the plot appealed to me; will the Dr. be able to deduct Rumpelstilizken’s identity based on the few clues he has? What drove “R” to such drastic measures?
Sadly I ended up not feeling drawn towards the characters at all; the style of writing was repetitive, clunky and strenuous to
read resulting in me being too bored to really care if Dr. Starks succeds or not. The book picks up speed in the last quarter and finally got me interested in finding out who R is but it was just too little, too late. The ending was also rather unsatisfying so overall I feel this book wasn’t worth my time and would not recommend it.

As a child I really liked the concept of the book; it has 24 chapters so you get to read one every day before Christmas and open the advent calendar with Joachim. My favourite character was the feisty little lamb that ran off with Elisabet. Now as an adult and just as much a
a book worm I still love the
idea of an advent calendar book, but sadly the story itself is severely lacking.
Basically Elisabet just travels south picking up a new person from the nativity story in different countries, a lot of it is repetitive and the backstory of the missing girl
is poorly explained, especially the ending is very abrupt for both the advent calendar story and the backstory leaving me feeling unsatisfied and like the book was a pointless read if nothing gets properly explained or resolved.

This book was okay. The romance about love so strong it conquers death is cute and I liked the diversity of the characters, but overall the book lacked suspense.

It really is mainly a love story, so it doesn't have fantasy elements or dive into the afterlife which would have been more up my alley.

It does give hope though so it
might be a good read for people struggling with the question of what happens after we die, especially because it doesn’t push any specific religious beliefs, instead saying that
"everyone goes where they believe they are going”.

I rather enjoyed this book, I listened to the audiobook version and
got through it in one day. Great if you're looking for
something easy and lighthearted to read during the holiday season. Bonus points for
Lily being a Christmas enthusiast
while Dash is more somber, so even if you're not the Christmas novel type you will have a character to relate to and the story isn't
a typical Christmas kitsch fest either

I watched the Netflix show after reading the book but was disappointed. They changed quite
a lot of the story and the characters were less charming. If you’ve seen the show I recommend
picking the book up anyway.

Being an animal lover and owning a rescue dog myself I enjoyed the setting and loved the dogs with all their individual personalities. The book was a light-hearted, easy listen during the holiday season and made me laugh out loud a couple times. Nevertheless the plot didn’t really grip me and the ending was rather foreseeable so I feel like you wouldn’t miss out if you didn’t read the book.

Killer Heels by Rebecca Chance was gifted to me quite a while ago, but since the cover mentions Fifty Shades of Grey and I don’t really read erotic novels it was just sitting on my shelf. I assumed it would be one of those books with little plot and lots of unrealistic sex but I couldn‘t have been more wrong. Killer Heels actually puts its main focus on the plot: Coco dreams of becoming a fashion magazine editor and works her 🍑 off as an assistant to her very bitchy, high-strung boss Victoria. More The Devil Wears Prada or Ugly Betty than Fifty Shades.

The latter does come into play when Jacob, the owner of the publishing house, takes a liking to Coco but the sexual scenes blend well into the story and aren’t just written for the sake of having a sex scene.

I breezed through the book and will definitely be picking up another Rebecca Chance novel in the future. I must, however, deduct one star from my overall rating because of an in my eyes major oversight: nowhere does the blurb mention that Jacob not only dominates Coco in the bedroom, they’re whole relationship is abusive: he likes stick-thin girls but Coco is a UK 12, so he forces her to become a size zero, until even her colleagues and family are worried about her “gaunt and skeletal” appearance. So please accept my trigger warning; do not read this book if you struggle with an ED or have issues about weight being discussed etc. as Coco’s life revolves around dieting, exercise and worrying if she’s thin enough.

The plot is interesting: a group of friends want to prove if good/God and evil/the devil really exist. Having recently read Dracula they decide the easiest way to go about this is finding a supernatural being, a “manifestation of evil” as they call it. Their search leads them to Bulgaria where rumours have it that a mysterious army of horsemen aids the Bulgarian people at night and then vanishes. Their hideout has never been discovered as it is supposedly under a spell to deter people from going near it.

Sadly, the book is very badly written though. Half of it could be scrapped at is contains lengthy monologues where the author inserts himself and his religious and philosophical opinions as narrator even though these don’t advance the story in any way as well as unnecessarily detailed descriptions of items and people down to their exact hight, weight and the colour of each strand of their hair.

Despite an also unnecessary and lengthy introduction stating the author’s intention to make the book interesting and easy to read he uses complicated words, long winded scentences and “poetry disguised as prose” aka a poem without line breaks which just makes its readability a disaster.

My recommendation: don’t waste your time on this book, but if you’re really interested in the actual story skip the introduction and first chapter as well as the monologues. You won’t miss anything important.