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mcdal's review against another edition
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Misogyny, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Kidnapping, and Sexual harassment
Moderate: Homophobia, Sexism, Blood, Police brutality, Stalking, and Injury/Injury detail
mandkips's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Sexual assault, and Murder
Moderate: Racial slurs and Kidnapping
Minor: Homophobia
venetiana's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
3.25
Great atmosphere and setup, loved the characters. Unfortunately very slow, and somewhat repetitive.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Blood, Murder, and Alcohol
Moderate: Hate crime and Racial slurs
Minor: Gun violence, Homophobia, Misogyny, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, Vomit, Police brutality, Medical content, Grief, Religious bigotry, Stalking, Lesbophobia, and Injury/Injury detail
talonsontypewriters's review
I tried to eke it out because I hate DNF'ing things, but if it's still this difficult to trudge through very short chapters over halfway through it's probably just going to get worse. I hate to say anything that implies debut = poor quality, because that's just not true in so many cases (and subjective anyway), but unfortunately it does apply here, at least for me.
The writing is painfully dull -- very choppy and simplistic, walls of stilted dialogue with no differentiating character voices, all telling and no showing, so much repetition and so many epithets -- and the plot isn't interesting enough to make up for it. A sense of suspense is almost nonexistent; any foreshadowing is too frequent and heavyhanded to be effective. I do feel some level of intrigue, but mostly just to confirm my suspicions, and it's not enough to get me to power through to see. Subplots are present in abundance and go unresolved and unacknowledged for chapters at a time, with awkward pacing and scene/chapter transitions.
All that alone makes anything hard to invest in, but I also can't get a sense of really any of the characters: Everything about them is told and not shown, and none of them really stand out. There are a lot of side characters, and I had trouble remembering who some of them were. Even the setting falls flat -- without some slang and a few technology notes, it would be indistinguishable from the present day, which is really disappointing because 1920s Harlem has so much to work with... and it just is not there.
Dead Dead Girls has so much potential, but sadly it's not followed up on as it could be. Maybe I'll be able to return to it in a more patient mood, but for now it's a hard pass.
The writing is painfully dull -- very choppy and simplistic, walls of stilted dialogue with no differentiating character voices, all telling and no showing, so much repetition and so many epithets -- and the plot isn't interesting enough to make up for it. A sense of suspense is almost nonexistent; any foreshadowing is too frequent and heavyhanded to be effective. I do feel some level of intrigue, but mostly just to confirm my suspicions, and it's not enough to get me to power through to see. Subplots are present in abundance and go unresolved and unacknowledged for chapters at a time, with awkward pacing and scene/chapter transitions.
All that alone makes anything hard to invest in, but I also can't get a sense of really any of the characters: Everything about them is told and not shown, and none of them really stand out. There are a lot of side characters, and I had trouble remembering who some of them were. Even the setting falls flat -- without some slang and a few technology notes, it would be indistinguishable from the present day, which is really disappointing because 1920s Harlem has so much to work with... and it just is not there.
Dead Dead Girls has so much potential, but sadly it's not followed up on as it could be. Maybe I'll be able to return to it in a more patient mood, but for now it's a hard pass.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Misogyny, Racism, Sexual assault, Violence, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Confinement, Gun violence, Pedophilia, Racial slurs, Police brutality, Kidnapping, Alcohol, and Sexual harassment
Minor: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Homophobia, Sexual content, Vomit, and Lesbophobia
Smoking, including underage. Descriptions of dead bodies. Broken arranged marriage between a 16- and 22-year-old, no actual romance (at least at this point); references to sexual dynamics between teenage girls and adult men. Attempted rape/sexual assault shown, others implied -- scene where police discuss assaulting a Black woman in custody.abookandaspotoftea's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Alcoholism, Homophobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Stalking, and Murder
aiyam's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Homophobia, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexual assault, and Sexual harassment
lormurenzi's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Misogyny, Racism, Kidnapping, Stalking, and Murder
Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Sexual assault, Violence, Blood, and Police brutality
Minor: Homophobia
paperpaladin's review against another edition
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.25
Dead Dead Girls is a mystery set in Harlem in the 1920s. Going into this I had high hopes about it and was hoping to find a new mystery series that I could read in between the longer fantasy books that I typically consume. Overall, this book was okay. Nothing great about it nothing terrible. It has a few problems that are due to it being the author's first published work but nothing that makes it unreadable. The characters have dimension, the plot is interesting enough, the situation has connection to the main character and stakes that you care about.
I do have two major concerns that lowered my overall enjoyment. Firstly, the foreshadowing is not subtle at all. The author likes to end chapters with a foreshadowing of what is to come but early on before the investigation into the mystery has really started, you are told who the murderer is. It doesn't say "the murderer is X" but pretty close to that. I do not read mysteries often and I figured it out so that might be upsetting if trying to figure out the mystery is part of the appeal.
My other concern is that this book was set in the wrong time period. This book really wanted to talk about homophobia and that kind of discrimination but was set in the 1920s so they couldn't discuss that as much as they would like. Instead the author had to focus more on the racism which didn't feel like they were as interested in talking about. The racism would come up but I think there was more time spent on the main character thinking about how her love is forbidden than their is on the racism in this book.The racism is also portrayed as one super racist cop who might not be as bad as you are first lead to believe and one seemingly nice detective who might actually be way worse than he seems. This feels like it is trying to say people are complicated and that racism is bad even if the person has other good qualities but I don't feel like it stuck the landing.
My rating system
1 - Did not enjoy
2 - Not irredeemable but has too many flaws to say I enjoyed
3 - Enjoyed it
4 - Great book but didn't love it
5 - Amazing book
I do have two major concerns that lowered my overall enjoyment. Firstly, the foreshadowing is not subtle at all. The author likes to end chapters with a foreshadowing of what is to come but early on before the investigation into the mystery has really started, you are told who the murderer is. It doesn't say "the murderer is X" but pretty close to that. I do not read mysteries often and I figured it out so that might be upsetting if trying to figure out the mystery is part of the appeal.
My other concern is that this book was set in the wrong time period. This book really wanted to talk about homophobia and that kind of discrimination but was set in the 1920s so they couldn't discuss that as much as they would like. Instead the author had to focus more on the racism which didn't feel like they were as interested in talking about. The racism would come up but I think there was more time spent on the main character thinking about how her love is forbidden than their is on the racism in this book.
My rating system
1 - Did not enjoy
2 - Not irredeemable but has too many flaws to say I enjoyed
3 - Enjoyed it
4 - Great book but didn't love it
5 - Amazing book
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death
Moderate: Racial slurs, Racism, and Violence
Minor: Homophobia
allisonwonderlandreads's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Dead Dead Girls is a 1920s historical mystery set on the streets of Harlem. Louise Lloyd earned local fame as a teenager when she freed herself from a kidnapper, rescuing her fellow prisoners in the process. A decade later, she does her best to sink into anonymity. She loves working in a cafe during the day, dancing the night away with her friends, and living in a boarding house where she can maximize time with her girlfriend, Rosa Maria. Louise's existence is thrown into disarray when she is conscripted by the police to help interview friends and family of victims in a recent spree of serial murders targeting Black girls in Harlem. Her role gets deeper and messier as Louise desperately tries to piece together the girls' lives and deaths. Although she gains a sense of purpose in trying to catch a murderer who is targeting girls much like her younger sisters or even herself, she regrets the loss of her carefree evenings as her sleuthing becomes all-consuming.
What I loved best about the story were the characters and the setting. The characters are intriguing and vivacious, Louise chief among them. Her found family is supportive and caring where her biological family has fraying bonds and animosities to contend with. She only retains a largely uncomplicated love for her younger twin sisters. Lou's romance is established, warm, and hopeful, even as the two women must consider how they can build a future together. The settings sparkle with clear detail and a sense of lived-in reality, from clubs to homes, cafes to crime scenes.
My only complaint has to do with the mystery pacing and explanation. I was fully invested for the first portion of the book, maybe even two-thirds of the story. The danger is always lurking, and Lou's twisty investigation turns up more questions than answers. In the latter part, there's a bit of waiting and then an abrupt final showdown. I don't feel like all the clues were rounded up or connected in a narrative to give things a sense of closure. False trails were left dangling rather than showing where they led if not to murder.
I am interested to see where the story goes next and find out how Louise's life adjusts in the aftermath of her second brush with celebrity. I would love to see how the characters continue to grow and peek into history yet again.
What I loved best about the story were the characters and the setting. The characters are intriguing and vivacious, Louise chief among them. Her found family is supportive and caring where her biological family has fraying bonds and animosities to contend with. She only retains a largely uncomplicated love for her younger twin sisters. Lou's romance is established, warm, and hopeful, even as the two women must consider how they can build a future together. The settings sparkle with clear detail and a sense of lived-in reality, from clubs to homes, cafes to crime scenes.
My only complaint has to do with the mystery pacing and explanation. I was fully invested for the first portion of the book, maybe even two-thirds of the story. The danger is always lurking, and Lou's twisty investigation turns up more questions than answers. In the latter part, there's a bit of waiting and then an abrupt final showdown. I don't feel like all the clues were rounded up or connected in a narrative to give things a sense of closure. False trails were left dangling rather than showing where they led if not to murder.
I am interested to see where the story goes next and find out how Louise's life adjusts in the aftermath of her second brush with celebrity. I would love to see how the characters continue to grow and peek into history yet again.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Kidnapping, Murder, and Alcohol
Moderate: Death of parent
Minor: Gun violence, Homophobia, and Lesbophobia
annabunce's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Homophobia, Racism, Rape, and Kidnapping