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cassidy_rain's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
“To kill someone required perfection, timing, and luck. I hoped all three were with me this evening.”
This is the second book I’ve read by this author and certainly won’t be my last. This is the perfect read for true crime and crime documentary lovers.
Don’t Believe It follows Sidney; she’s a documentary maker who has a knack for making documentaries on the wrongfully accused and imprisoned. Her newest documentary is showcasing Grace, who may or may not have been wrongfully convicted of killing her boyfriend on a vacation ten years prior. Sidney is her last chance at an acquittal.
Since Sidney makes documentaries, it switches back and forth between the actual storyline and the “documentary” that she’s developing as the story moves along. It took me a minute to get used to this writing style, but once I did I flew through this. I really liked that the story follows the documentary timeline. It’s very cool to find out info at the same time as the investigator (and world watching the documentary essentially).
A few things felt maybe a little far fetched or left me with questions, but overall I was pretty satisfied how it all tied together. I kept switching who I thought the actual murderer was chapter by chapter, but was still left baffled and surprised. Little clues are left throughout the story to steer your mind in all directions, along with enough clues that makes the final reveal make sense and feel satisfying. I’m by no means an expert in crime scenes or autopsies, but the way he writes these scenes are super fleshed out and realistic feeling. It really did feel like watching an episode of dateline. The ending felt a little abrupt, but overall I liked it.
Would highly recommend picking this up!
This is the second book I’ve read by this author and certainly won’t be my last. This is the perfect read for true crime and crime documentary lovers.
Don’t Believe It follows Sidney; she’s a documentary maker who has a knack for making documentaries on the wrongfully accused and imprisoned. Her newest documentary is showcasing Grace, who may or may not have been wrongfully convicted of killing her boyfriend on a vacation ten years prior. Sidney is her last chance at an acquittal.
Since Sidney makes documentaries, it switches back and forth between the actual storyline and the “documentary” that she’s developing as the story moves along. It took me a minute to get used to this writing style, but once I did I flew through this. I really liked that the story follows the documentary timeline. It’s very cool to find out info at the same time as the investigator (and world watching the documentary essentially).
A few things felt maybe a little far fetched or left me with questions, but overall I was pretty satisfied how it all tied together. I kept switching who I thought the actual murderer was chapter by chapter, but was still left baffled and surprised. Little clues are left throughout the story to steer your mind in all directions, along with enough clues that makes the final reveal make sense and feel satisfying. I’m by no means an expert in crime scenes or autopsies, but the way he writes these scenes are super fleshed out and realistic feeling. It really did feel like watching an episode of dateline. The ending felt a little abrupt, but overall I liked it.
Would highly recommend picking this up!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder
Moderate: Chronic illness, Confinement, Blood, Car accident, and Injury/Injury detail
rhgrimes's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Mental illness, Violence, Blood, Car accident, and Murder
destinyf1988's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder
Moderate: Car accident
Minor: Alcohol
rochelleisreading's review
dark
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood, and Car accident
Moderate: Death, Mental illness, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Toxic friendship
upgirlcd's review against another edition
adventurous
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Plot was interesting & really amped up the last /4 of the book. Characters had no depth whatsoever...really good twist in the end. Best part of the book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Murder
Minor: Death, Car accident, and Injury/Injury detail
minimicropup's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
Performative, effusive, quixotic.
We follow a documentary filmmaker taking on the case of a young couple, one of which was accused of murdering the other at a friend's wedding..
🇺🇸 🇱🇨Set in Manhattan, NY over the course of June and July 2017, with snippets of the documentary outlining the events at a Saint Lucian resort in 2007.
🐺🐕Growls, Howls, and Tail Wags:
🥱 This was a slog for me. It started off interesting and went downhill pretty fast. I liked the overall plot but struggled to get through how this was written. I spent most of the book wanting to get back to the original premise and mystery.
😑 Imagination smashing. We are introduced to so many characters, some that are almost a one-off, and we never get any descriptions of any of them. That's fine, it's just the type of story where we can imagine people as we wish, right? Wrong. One of the main characters (Sidney) is not described until past the 50% mark.
😣 Fragmented. Not in a good way. Didn't contribute to mystery, only frustration from the lack of focus. I felt like especially in the second half, we would get random jury information, chapters about political people and federal investigators where it read like a list of how they find out about the documentary findings, but in the process we lose the documentary angle almost entirely.
🤥 Suspend that disbelief. A medical examiner is filmed bashing in corpse heads as part of an experiment to see if their head wounds will match the original crime.... She just asked the medical dept if they had extra bodies while acknowledging there are ways to do this without beating up dead people who donated their bodies to science. Is this really a thing? Contrived interviews where most people either spill their guts or "accidentally" spill their guts then remember they're being recorded.
🥴 Do you want to read a weekly planner and meeting agendas? You'll love this! I swear there are entire chapters where most of it is just "___ will send the footage to ____, then ____ will edit and review, in time for ____ to get their post-production team on it for release by 9 am tomorrow, so we can follow up with ____ and ____ for their 10 am meeting." I'm BARELY exaggerating.
😖 Take the above and repeat. Essentially by the 50% mark all the documentary investigative reporting facts are rehashed to us along with meeting details and viewership numbers. It's repetitive and irrelevant to character development and plot. It felt like 14 people wrote this and none read what the others already covered.
🫠 Overexplainy, contrived dialogue. In a staff meeting at a cable station, one of them has a long winded explanation what Neilson ratings are and how streaming works, as if no one in the room knows. It wasn't even angled as, like, he can't read the room. There are several instances of this where dialogue is used to "educate" the reader instead of just telling us straight up if we really need to know.
🤨 You know what could be fun? Introducing an important character by listing their day-to-day struggles to get to the bathroom. Do that for a couple chapters. We have NO idea who this person is and why we have so much detail on their day-to-day life (which is basically the same every day). Then they suddenly become a main character at around the 60% mark.
😑 Imagination smashing. We are introduced to so many characters, some that are almost a one-off, and we never get any descriptions of any of them. That's fine, it's just the type of story where we can imagine people as we wish, right? Wrong. One of the main characters (Sidney) is not described until past the 50% mark.
😣 Fragmented. Not in a good way. Didn't contribute to mystery, only frustration from the lack of focus. I felt like especially in the second half, we would get random jury information, chapters about political people and federal investigators where it read like a list of how they find out about the documentary findings, but in the process we lose the documentary angle almost entirely.
🤥 Suspend that disbelief. A medical examiner is filmed bashing in corpse heads as part of an experiment to see if their head wounds will match the original crime.... She just asked the medical dept if they had extra bodies while acknowledging there are ways to do this without beating up dead people who donated their bodies to science. Is this really a thing? Contrived interviews where most people either spill their guts or "accidentally" spill their guts then remember they're being recorded.
🥴 Do you want to read a weekly planner and meeting agendas? You'll love this! I swear there are entire chapters where most of it is just "___ will send the footage to ____, then ____ will edit and review, in time for ____ to get their post-production team on it for release by 9 am tomorrow, so we can follow up with ____ and ____ for their 10 am meeting." I'm BARELY exaggerating.
😖 Take the above and repeat. Essentially by the 50% mark all the documentary investigative reporting facts are rehashed to us along with meeting details and viewership numbers. It's repetitive and irrelevant to character development and plot. It felt like 14 people wrote this and none read what the others already covered.
🫠 Overexplainy, contrived dialogue. In a staff meeting at a cable station, one of them has a long winded explanation what Neilson ratings are and how streaming works, as if no one in the room knows. It wasn't even angled as, like, he can't read the room. There are several instances of this where dialogue is used to "educate" the reader instead of just telling us straight up if we really need to know.
🤨 You know what could be fun? Introducing an important character by listing their day-to-day struggles to get to the bathroom. Do that for a couple chapters. We have NO idea who this person is and why we have so much detail on their day-to-day life (which is basically the same every day). Then they suddenly become a main character at around the 60% mark.
Mood Reading Match Up:
- Touches of investigative journalism excerpts
- Detailed documentary production behind-the-scenes fiction
- True crime whodunnit energy
- Vacay isolated resort suspense
Content Heads-Up: Murder. Possible false accusation. Ableism. Car accident (life-altering injury). Drunk driving. Traumatic brain injury and immobility.
Format: Library Digital via Libby
Content Warnings
Moderate: Ableism, Forced institutionalization, Car accident, and Murder
Minor: Alcohol
3readingcircus's review against another edition
fast-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Blood, Medical content, and Car accident
Moderate: Ableism and Gun violence
Minor: Alcoholism, Slavery, Suicide, Vomit, and Antisemitism
parasolcrafter's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
the premise of this book was interesting and it was pretty good for the majority of the book, but the ending falls completely flat and makes the entire book completely unenjoyable overall. there are far too many loose ends and tidbits of information that ended up not meaning anything in the long-run, and the end is a cheap way at a 'gotcha!' ending as the ONLY reason it catches readers off guard is because there is no way for us to have predicted it. its not satisfying. this isnt a book that i think back on and see where i could have connected dots and didnt for one reason or another; dots arent able to be connected in a way where the reader feels like theyre figuring things out because everything is so convoluted. ugh.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Child death, Cursing, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Violence, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Car accident, Murder, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Lesbophobia