I feel so bad dnfing this book and I’m definitely in the minority in terms of my thoughts about it. I just think this type of book isn’t for me. I wasn’t into the writing style and the plot itself was uninteresting to me. I found myself not caring what happened even during parts that were supposed to get a reaction from me. I did enjoy the discussions of what it’s like to be transgender and the struggle of deciding who you truly are despite the expectations of those around you but that’s about all I enjoyed. I wanted to push myself to finish the last hundred pages but it’s just been sitting on my shelf so I’m officially giving up. I’m still open to trying more of their books in the future though!

I was not a fan of this book. I normally NEVER dnf books but I decided that this was just not worth spending my time reading. The synopsis sounded so promising but the story moved so slow and I honestly didn’t care about the characters or what happened to them at all. On top of that I think I’m just not a fan of high school based contemporaries. You’d think I’d be able to relate to them but meh. They’re just not for me. This was disappointing to say the least.

I loved this so much! It felt like reading little fairytales and had the most gorgeous illustrations to go along with each Saint.

 After reading both In the Dream House and Her Body and Other Parties, I'm realizing that maybe Carmen Maria Machado's writing is not for me, as brilliant and unique as it is. The first maybe 30 pages really pulled me in and I was tabbing passages I loved and thinking this might be a new favorite. However, that feeling slowly dwindled and by the end of the book, I felt like I had to force myself to finish. The sections that talked about Machado's relationship with her abusive girlfriend in a more straightforward way really spoke to me, but much of the book was written in more abstract ways that just didn't do anything for me. I think I would've felt much more moved by the story if I had been able to read about Machado's feelings and experiences in a more direct and linear narrative style instead of getting them through abstract snippets that I had to try to decode. I felt like I was just waiting the entire time for the moment to arrive when we were really going to dive into the nitty-gritty details of the relationship and it never came.

I am glad this book exists to shed some light on queer abusive relationships because that is rarely talked about, and based on other people's reviews I know that this book speaks to so many people. Unfortunately, although I did connect with portions of it and learned from it, it didn't live up to the hype for me and I didn't find it as profound as I wanted to. However, I might give it a reread in the future to see if I might understand it better or connect with it more the second time around. 

 I'm feeling so many emotions right now after finally finishing this series 6 years after I started it. I am at once heartbroken that it is over, fulfilled that I finally know how everything ends, and relieved that it ended in such a perfect way. I couldn't have asked for a better ending and I am more in love with this series than ever before. 

This book was so heartbreaking at times that I had to call my boyfriend so that he could cheer me up lol

It definitely had me tearing up quite a few times and I loved Ben so much as a character. Oh and let me tell you I was absolutely eating up the drama.

 This was such a wild ride! It was action-packed from the very first page to the very last and constantly had me wondering what was going to happen next. The world-building, characters, and writing were all so well done and gripping. It was such a well-rounded story. The only thing I could have done without was some of the romantic elements, but they were so minor that it didn't hinder my enjoyment all that much.

This was definitely one of those books where I was so excited to find out how it ended but as soon as I was done I was left with a sadness that it was over. Luckily, there are three more books and I can't wait to pick them up to see how the story progresses! 

I think this was an entertaining read that at times was emotional and at others made me laugh out loud. I appreciated that there was emotional depth to the main characters and that they were dealing with things in their lives outside of their romantic relationship with each other. However, I really didn't connect to the romance at all until the very very end (like literally the epilogue) and I didn't feel like the story or characters overall really grabbed me. 

I mainly picked up this book because the author is from my home state and I didn't know much about the actual subject matter, so I definitely didn't expect to love this as much as I did. This book was such a rollercoaster ride and although so much of it was difficult to read because of the subject matter, it was compulsively readable. Ashley C. Ford wrote about her experiences so beautifully and powerfully, and I felt so much for her along the way.

The only thing keeping me from giving it a full 5 stars is that I wished she had talked a little bit more about her relationship with her father because I was definitely left with questions. How does someone build a relationship with someone who has done something so terrible? How do you reconcile what he has done while also wanting to be close to him and have him in your life? I wished she had talked more about that because I imagine it was a very hard thing to navigate. Also, I noticed that the second half of the book after she graduated high school wasn't quite as gripping as the first half, but the ending definitely pulled me back in.

I think one of my favorite things about this book was actually her relationship with her mother. It was complicated and messy and very unhealthy at many times. Her mother was abusive both physically and verbally when Ashley was young but somehow they ended up having some sort of relationship when she got older. Although it was definitely hard to read about how her mother treated her, hearing her talk about what it's like to navigate a relationship that is so complicated was very captivating.

Overall, I loved this book so much and definitely see myself buying my own copy so that I can reread and highlight it. I highly recommend it!

 

The first line of the synopsis for the book compares it to Gone Girl and Girl on the Train, two of my all-time favorite books... This was nothing like them. At. All. I really don't understand how they thought Baby Doll was anything close to them.

It was suuuuper slow-paced first of all. I read almost half of the book and only 2-3 days had passed. For a book that is supposed to be suspenseful, that's ridiculously slow in my opinion. It also read entirely like a Wattpad book. Now, I personally have nothing against Wattpad writers. I used to be obsessed with that website and I think some stories on there are incredible. But for a book that's compared to two of the most popular suspense/crime novels, that's just not the kind of writing that I was expecting.

Like I said, I read almost half of the book and it felt like absolutely nothing had happened. I could probably sum up almost 150 pages in five words.

Overall just wasn't what I was expecting and didn't live up to my expectations at all.