Take a photo of a barcode or cover
typedtruths's Reviews (1.8k)
➸ Trigger warnings for
▷ Representation: Molly (mc) is Jewish, fat & has anxiety; Reid (li) is Jewish; Cassie (sc) is queer; Min (sc) is Korean & pansexual; Abby (sc) is Black; Nadine (sc) is Black and a lesbian; Patty (sc) is bisexual.
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
➸ <u>Trigger warnings</u> for
<a href="https://typedtruth.wordpress.com/"> Blog</a> • <a href="https://triggerwarningdatabase.com/">Trigger Warning Database</a> • <a href="https://twitter.com/typedtruths">Twitter</a> • <a href="https://www.instagram.com/typedtruths/">Instagram</a>
#1) Giant Days, Vol. 1 ★★★★☆
#2) Giant Days, Vol. 2 ★★★★☆
#3) Giant Days, Vol. 3 ★★★★☆
#4) Giant Days, Vol. 4 ★★★★☆
#5) Giant Days, Vol. 5 ★★★★☆
➸ Trigger warnings for
▷ Representation: Daisy (mc) is a lesbian.
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
#1) Giant Days, Vol. 1 ★★★★☆
#2) Giant Days, Vol. 2 ★★★★☆
#3) Giant Days, Vol. 3 ★★★★☆
#4) Giant Days, Vol. 4 ★★★★☆
#6) Giant Days, Vol. 6 ★★★★☆
➸ Trigger warnings for
▷ Representation: Daisy (mc) is a lesbian.
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
Lies She Told had been getting a little bit of hype on my GR feed. When it appeared on the What's Hot section of my library, I decided to give it a chance. I'd been wanting to get back into adult psychological thrillers for a while anyway... but this was not the book to hook me on the genre.
Why didn't it work for me?
First of all, I am not going to even deny that I dropped an entire star for the use of the Bury Your Gays trope. I'm so not here for that. I was also not a big fan of the way that mental illness was treated in this story. It felt entirely unrealistic. I mean, really, having a type of trauma-induced amnesia that makes you forget that you had depression? Yeah, no. Depression is something that affects your daily life; even in recovery, your symptoms are not nonexistent, especially without ongoing (conscious) effort. The fact that her friends and family would purposefully hide Liza's history of mental illness from her was hard to wrap my head around. Do they really not understand that that is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible? For so many reasons! The poor depression representation (if that is what it was even meant to be) could have been fixed if the author had simply made it clear that suicidal ideation and depression are not mutually exclusive.
Also, the Trinidadian love interest’s skin colour was described using a food analogue. Ick.
Mainly, though, it was a personal thing. It is just my luck that the first adult thriller I picked up since I decided to get back into the genre had so many elements I tend to avoid: cheating, pregnancy/newborns... and amnesia. I despise amnesia being used in mysteries to create suspense. It is a real psychological condition that deserves most respect, for one thing, but is also a lazy writing tool. There is a difference between having an unreliable narrator and manipulating the narrator to ‘forget’ certain information to build suspense.
Adding to that, I did not like any of the characters, especially Liza, and the writing style was a bit of a miss for me. It was to the point and lacked a lot of detail. This helped drive the story forward, yes, but I would have liked some more time spent on the characterisation.
I will say that the idea of having an author’s fiction and reality blur was fantastic. It worked well and, for a thriller, it did its job to keep me on my toes. It was incredibly predictable but it definitely succeeded in keeping me engaged throughout the story.
Overall?
This definitely had the potential to be suspenseful and engaging. I loved how it featured authors and writing at its forefront, and the blurring of reality was done well. It just needed to write about mental illness from a place of respect, rather than twisting it to suit a story, and not kill off literally every queer character.
➸ Trigger warnings forsuicide, homomisia, murder, forced coming out, pregnancy & fertility-related medical conditions, depression, and child sexual abuse & rape .
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
Why didn't it work for me?
First of all, I am not going to even deny that I dropped an entire star for the use of the Bury Your Gays trope. I'm so not here for that. I was also not a big fan of the way that mental illness was treated in this story. It felt entirely unrealistic. I mean, really, having a type of trauma-induced amnesia that makes you forget that you had depression? Yeah, no. Depression is something that affects your daily life; even in recovery, your symptoms are not nonexistent, especially without ongoing (conscious) effort. The fact that her friends and family would purposefully hide Liza's history of mental illness from her was hard to wrap my head around. Do they really not understand that that is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible? For so many reasons! The poor depression representation (if that is what it was even meant to be) could have been fixed if the author had simply made it clear that suicidal ideation and depression are not mutually exclusive.
Also, the Trinidadian love interest’s skin colour was described using a food analogue. Ick.
Mainly, though, it was a personal thing. It is just my luck that the first adult thriller I picked up since I decided to get back into the genre had so many elements I tend to avoid: cheating, pregnancy/newborns... and amnesia. I despise amnesia being used in mysteries to create suspense. It is a real psychological condition that deserves most respect, for one thing, but is also a lazy writing tool. There is a difference between having an unreliable narrator and manipulating the narrator to ‘forget’ certain information to build suspense.
Adding to that, I did not like any of the characters, especially Liza, and the writing style was a bit of a miss for me. It was to the point and lacked a lot of detail. This helped drive the story forward, yes, but I would have liked some more time spent on the characterisation.
I will say that the idea of having an author’s fiction and reality blur was fantastic. It worked well and, for a thriller, it did its job to keep me on my toes. It was incredibly predictable but it definitely succeeded in keeping me engaged throughout the story.
Overall?
This definitely had the potential to be suspenseful and engaging. I loved how it featured authors and writing at its forefront, and the blurring of reality was done well. It just needed to write about mental illness from a place of respect, rather than twisting it to suit a story, and not kill off literally every queer character.
➸ Trigger warnings for
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
➸ Trigger warnings for
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
#1) Giant Days, Vol. 1 ★★★★☆
#2) Giant Days, Vol. 2 ★★★★☆
#3) Giant Days, Vol. 3 ★★★★☆
➸ Trigger warnings for
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
The Upside of Falling Down had a promising premise but it didn’t deliver the story I expected. I was all here for magical realism and Ireland but the uncomfortable romance that replaced it was not my cup of tea. Maybe if miscommunication and lying were not one of my biggest turnoffs in romance, it wouldn’t have been so bad. I just struggle to see how people can ship two characters whose entire relationship is based on false impressions and straight up manipulation… which is why Clementine and Kieran’s relationship didn’t work for me. Kieran’s behaviour was simply unacceptable. The lengths he took to pull off that level of manipulation made me sick. I cannot believe that he genuinely believed he was doing the right thing. I wanted Clementine to have nothing to do with him. I was in complete agreement with Siobhan.
The plot was also so goddamn unbelievable. I empathise with Clementine’s situation - meeting her father was a Big Step that she was not ready to take - but the plot preceding her escape from the hospital was kind of ridiculous. I couldn’t suspend my belief that far. It is probably a preference thing but I wanted to focus on Clementine working through her trauma, discovering who she wanted to be as a person and all of that, not a convoluted romance.
Oh well.
➸ Trigger warnings forundiagnosed ptsd, pregnant sc, childbirth & labour, hospitalisation, death of a friend, death of a boyfriend, plane crash recounted, and dubcon/rape by coercion*.
*The situation is two characters in a sexual relationship are lying about their identities and manipulating each other .
▷ Representation: Clementine (mc) has retrograde amnesia.
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
The plot was also so goddamn unbelievable. I empathise with Clementine’s situation - meeting her father was a Big Step that she was not ready to take - but the plot preceding her escape from the hospital was kind of ridiculous. I couldn’t suspend my belief that far. It is probably a preference thing but I wanted to focus on Clementine working through her trauma, discovering who she wanted to be as a person and all of that, not a convoluted romance.
Oh well.
➸ Trigger warnings for
*The situation is two characters in a sexual relationship are lying about their identities and manipulating each other
▷ Representation: Clementine (mc) has retrograde amnesia.
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
If you know me at all, you know how much I adore mysteries and thrillers. I have since I was a kid, and since last year, I’ve also found a new fascination with cults. Ferris’ Black promised to deliver on both of these fronts, and umm, didn’t really achieve that. At all.
From the very first page, I had a problem with the writing style. It was just so juvenile! The descriptions were repetitive and basic. It was hard to pick up the detail of the settings or the character’s descriptions. I have no idea what anyone looked like, apart from Ebony’s iconic black hair. We were told things, instead of being shown, especially regarding the character’s emotions. Backstories were dumped at us, and the dialogue was stilted and forced. Ferris’ attempt at witty banter made me cringe. Her use of slang was slightly off - she was trying too hard to sound like a teenager - and it came off as cheesy. The number of times Ebony giggled when she was talking to a male character was… it was too much.
The characters themselves didn’t help. I couldn’t have cared less about any of them. I never hated the ‘villains’ or felt sympathy for Ged or Ebony’s mother. Every character was flat and dull; even Ebony’s classmates felt unrealistic. Ebony was as bland as boiled rice and such a Special Snowflakes. She had the 'pretty but didn’t know it' thing going on so everyone was ‘unintentionally’ falling in love with her. It was nauseating. Both of the romantic interests - of course, there’s a love triangle - were similarly underdeveloped. Both Ed and Aiden’s relationships with Ebony were forced. They had no connection, and it didn’t help that they had the personalities of wet paper bags.
What was most disappointed, however, was the plot. It was unbelievable and utterly bland. (I apologise for overusing that word, but it honestly sums up every aspect of this book!) I wasn’t that it was predictable, though it largely was, it was that I have read this story before - and I’ve seen it done better. It wasn’t thrilling in the slightest. This may have been a result of unengaging writing, but there wasn’t really a mystery to be investigating. It lacked urgency. I never really felt like Ebony had a real reason for caring about this random person’s death. Sure, the death of her friends was a little suspicious but in the end, their deaths didn’t actually have anything to do with anything... so I still don’t see why she was even involved in all of this? Maybe if I had understood the character’s motivations more than I would have enjoyed the book more. It seems to me that if Ebony’s parents had moved straight away - after the weird incident - literally none of this would have happened...
Overall?
I don’t think this book bought anything new to the table. It was boring and flat. The characters were dull, and the plot put me to sleep. I’m not sure Ferris’ writing style is for me, but I’m hoping her debut will be more enjoyable. I would only recommend this book if you were a die-hard fan of the similarly abysmal, [b:The Cellar|16066586|The Cellar (The Cellar, #1)|Natasha Preston|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1349350056s/16066586.jpg|21857831].
➸ Trigger warnings fordomestic violence, suicide, death, murder, physical assault, kidnapping, car accident, and bullying .
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram
From the very first page, I had a problem with the writing style. It was just so juvenile! The descriptions were repetitive and basic. It was hard to pick up the detail of the settings or the character’s descriptions. I have no idea what anyone looked like, apart from Ebony’s iconic black hair. We were told things, instead of being shown, especially regarding the character’s emotions. Backstories were dumped at us, and the dialogue was stilted and forced. Ferris’ attempt at witty banter made me cringe. Her use of slang was slightly off - she was trying too hard to sound like a teenager - and it came off as cheesy. The number of times Ebony giggled when she was talking to a male character was… it was too much.
The characters themselves didn’t help. I couldn’t have cared less about any of them. I never hated the ‘villains’ or felt sympathy for Ged or Ebony’s mother. Every character was flat and dull; even Ebony’s classmates felt unrealistic. Ebony was as bland as boiled rice and such a Special Snowflakes. She had the 'pretty but didn’t know it' thing going on so everyone was ‘unintentionally’ falling in love with her. It was nauseating. Both of the romantic interests - of course, there’s a love triangle - were similarly underdeveloped. Both Ed and Aiden’s relationships with Ebony were forced. They had no connection, and it didn’t help that they had the personalities of wet paper bags.
What was most disappointed, however, was the plot. It was unbelievable and utterly bland. (I apologise for overusing that word, but it honestly sums up every aspect of this book!) I wasn’t that it was predictable, though it largely was, it was that I have read this story before - and I’ve seen it done better. It wasn’t thrilling in the slightest. This may have been a result of unengaging writing, but there wasn’t really a mystery to be investigating. It lacked urgency. I never really felt like Ebony had a real reason for caring about this random person’s death. Sure, the death of her friends was a little suspicious but in the end, their deaths didn’t actually have anything to do with anything... so I still don’t see why she was even involved in all of this? Maybe if I had understood the character’s motivations more than I would have enjoyed the book more. It seems to me that if Ebony’s parents had moved straight away - after the weird incident - literally none of this would have happened...
Overall?
I don’t think this book bought anything new to the table. It was boring and flat. The characters were dull, and the plot put me to sleep. I’m not sure Ferris’ writing style is for me, but I’m hoping her debut will be more enjoyable. I would only recommend this book if you were a die-hard fan of the similarly abysmal, [b:The Cellar|16066586|The Cellar (The Cellar, #1)|Natasha Preston|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1349350056s/16066586.jpg|21857831].
➸ Trigger warnings for
Blog • Goodreads • Twitter • Instagram