Reviews

Scandal by Franziska Weyer, Anna Godbersen

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ajune22's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced

4.0

edithmariegreen's review against another edition

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slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

hiltzmoore's review against another edition

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1.0

I should say, I don't really like "Gossip Girl" style books. I should also say that historical fiction is one of my favorite genres. So this book, which is a combination of a "Gossip Girl" type book and a VERY poor historical fiction really disappointed me. It was predictable, didn't teach me anything about the historical age it was depicting, and the writing was bad (too much description of dresses with no purpose). I felt like the characters were straight out of a modern age teen serial novel with no change in their angsty thoughts or actions appropriate to the historical era. Some may say that makes the characters more realistic, but I found it to be a barely veiled attempt at keeping the modern day reader engaged in an otherwise predictable and boring story.

mothemo22's review against another edition

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3.0

similar to bridgerton. Great story but a little bit predictable.

glitterbomb47's review against another edition

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3.0

100th book of the year!

3.5 stars.

camihawk's review against another edition

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4.0

I was hesistant to pick up The Luxe at first, but I was not disappointed, it was filled to the brim with romance, scandals, and plot twists. The Luxe was set in Victorian New York City, Anna Godbersen did such a good job with the Victorian Era that you could breath it in.

I am a huge fan of books set in the Victorain Era so I was ecstatic to find that Anna Godbersen is a master of Victorian New York City. Anna painted the setting of New York City in 1899 beautifully, she has a good attention for detail that brings the images to life in the mind. I loved seeing how the era was in every action of the characters, and the little rules of the society that might not have been expected.

The Luxe had five narrators and I could tell apart their narrations yet they also flowed easily. I enjoyed watching the characters as they fought against society’s rules, each striking out in their own way. Each of the character were well developed, all of them had such different perspective on the society, goals, and fears. The characters seemed to balance each other out, if I was irritated one then I was happy with another. It was so interesting to watch each of the character’s push, and pull against each other to get what they wanted.

The plot is a little slow to get started with, but this was because it set up intensely for the rest of
The Luxe. Once the plot started moving, I was racing through the pages to see how it would end. I loved watching each of the character’s plot lines wind around each other, so that it became one plot with many different strings, it came together seemlessly. There were several twists and turns to the plot of The Luxe that I would have never guessed. The ending wrapped up nicely but also set up nicely for the next book.

The Luxe by Anna Godbersen really brought to life the Victorian Era and society’s crushing weight of expectations from its people. All of the character’s were well developed and full of faults, so they were human. Despite the slow beginning I enjoyed watching the plot come together. I am definitely going to follow this series, The Luxe is not a book you want to miss.