jade_courtney's review against another edition
4.0
I DEVOURED this. When I thought I was in the mood for a ya mystery true-crime thriller type book, something like Sadie, I was not wrong and this did not disappoint! I had to know what happened because for so long I had no idea! Then I was able to put a couple of pieces of the puzzle together (which was very satisfying). But I do have to say a piece or two doesn't sit with me as well. Overall though, I thoroughly enjoyed this! (Highly recommend the audiobook too!)
curseofachilles's review against another edition
4.0
Finally! A read that is more than 3 stars!
July had been a hellish in the book world for me. If you notice, I kind of got into a bad books streak this month. The highest I could manage was a three star. It’s not the books’ fault, of course. I literally have several books lying around in my shelf but I have yet to find the motivation to read said books and read other books instead.
So I present to you: the YA [b:The Girl on the Train|22557272|The Girl on the Train|Paula Hawkins|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1574805682l/22557272._SX50_.jpg|41107568], the first book with more than a 3 star rating of July 2020 for now; even though it’s already the 28th. If you like mind-fucking stories with twists and turns and unreliable narrators, this one is for you.
Anna Cicconi is one of the trouble kids at Bay Ridge (I think it’s called Bay Ridge? Forgive me if I spelled it wrong). She’s that girl. One that lives for the party life, fucked herself up and ended up going home in a police car. In the summer before going away from college, she decided she needed a clean slate, so she applied for a job as a nanny for this rich family in another town. When she arrived, she didn’t expect to be regarded in a cold way by the townsfolk. Apparently, Anna had a very similar face to a Zoe Spanos, a nineteen year old girl who recently went missing.
Now here’s the deal: this book has two interloping timelines; the past chapters when Anna first started her nanny job, and the present chapters when she was arrested and the case was under investigation. Now here’s the dealbreaker: there are podcasts.
The ‘present’ chapters are written in such a compelling way that I flew through them but the ‘past’ chapters could use a little more work. Aside from the fact that it used a first person POV (Anna’s) and it was narrated in a not-so-good way, there are so many fillers. Though there’s a certain chill when you read the past chapter, many parts of the past chapters are like fillers and unnecessary, boring, teen drama stuff going on. It’s mostly about Anna making friends, nannying and being a creep (we’ll get into that later). It kind of took away the chill and sometimes I had to convince myself that I was reading a thriller, not a contemporary romance.
Anna herself is quite a boring protagonist. She’s two dimensional and her character doesn’t have enough depth to make me like her. I’m not even sure she has a personality. Also, she’s a CREEP. I don’t understand how her gears work and why she did whatever the hell she did but we spent a good deal of the past chapters reading about her stalking habits. To keep it simple, she got into a ‘relationship’ with Caden Talbot, who was Zoe’s boyfriend. Anna met Caden when she creepily visited his house in the middle of the night. Over the course of the book, she also stealthily broke into Caden’s home and even using her employer’s computer while she was away from home. Maybe I was wrong; maybe she has a personality, but I had a hard time seeing that past her obsession with Caden. Her entire personality could be summarized perfectly in page 200:
But well, she’s a protagonist in a thriller novel and all thriller novel protagonists are creeps.
But as boring as she was, reading Anna’s chapter make me notice right off the bat that there was something wrong with her, and I can’t shake that feeling. The thriller element; that feeling that there’ something dark and unsettling behind the good façade is there which proves how talented Kit Frick is. As mundane as the past chapters are (because they mostly speak about teen drama stuff), it inserts the thriller chill little by little which makes me the more curious to find out what exactly went wrong on New Year’s eve. It was a quick read and it was satisfying.
The podcast element though, was slightly of a disappointment. The podcast transcripts were written in a childish way and it came out all wrong. But looking back, I think it kind of suits because that said podcast was done by an amateur sixteen year old girl after all.
I think this is one of those books that could be a 5 star material had it been handled in a better way; a little tweak here and there and voila! It’s a total mind-fuck and half of the time I don’t even know what the hell is going on and which of the characters’ stories are true. I think it would do a little better if the author tried to insert more ‘foreshadowing’ leading up to the big reveal because I would’ve enjoyed it more had there been more foreshadowing and less mundane teen life. It was a solid 3 star read because even though I enjoyed how things wrapped up, I was kind of bummed with the past chapters. That extra 1 star was for chapter 36 alone because what the fuck?
July had been a hellish in the book world for me. If you notice, I kind of got into a bad books streak this month. The highest I could manage was a three star. It’s not the books’ fault, of course. I literally have several books lying around in my shelf but I have yet to find the motivation to read said books and read other books instead.
So I present to you: the YA [b:The Girl on the Train|22557272|The Girl on the Train|Paula Hawkins|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1574805682l/22557272._SX50_.jpg|41107568], the first book with more than a 3 star rating of July 2020 for now; even though it’s already the 28th. If you like mind-fucking stories with twists and turns and unreliable narrators, this one is for you.
Anna Cicconi is one of the trouble kids at Bay Ridge (I think it’s called Bay Ridge? Forgive me if I spelled it wrong). She’s that girl. One that lives for the party life, fucked herself up and ended up going home in a police car. In the summer before going away from college, she decided she needed a clean slate, so she applied for a job as a nanny for this rich family in another town. When she arrived, she didn’t expect to be regarded in a cold way by the townsfolk. Apparently, Anna had a very similar face to a Zoe Spanos, a nineteen year old girl who recently went missing.
Now here’s the deal: this book has two interloping timelines; the past chapters when Anna first started her nanny job, and the present chapters when she was arrested and the case was under investigation. Now here’s the dealbreaker: there are podcasts.
The ‘present’ chapters are written in such a compelling way that I flew through them but the ‘past’ chapters could use a little more work. Aside from the fact that it used a first person POV (Anna’s) and it was narrated in a not-so-good way, there are so many fillers. Though there’s a certain chill when you read the past chapter, many parts of the past chapters are like fillers and unnecessary, boring, teen drama stuff going on. It’s mostly about Anna making friends, nannying and being a creep (we’ll get into that later). It kind of took away the chill and sometimes I had to convince myself that I was reading a thriller, not a contemporary romance.
Anna herself is quite a boring protagonist. She’s two dimensional and her character doesn’t have enough depth to make me like her. I’m not even sure she has a personality. Also, she’s a CREEP. I don’t understand how her gears work and why she did whatever the hell she did but we spent a good deal of the past chapters reading about her stalking habits. To keep it simple, she got into a ‘relationship’ with Caden Talbot, who was Zoe’s boyfriend. Anna met Caden when she creepily visited his house in the middle of the night. Over the course of the book, she also stealthily broke into Caden’s home and even using her employer’s computer while she was away from home. Maybe I was wrong; maybe she has a personality, but I had a hard time seeing that past her obsession with Caden. Her entire personality could be summarized perfectly in page 200:
I know it’s none of my business what’s on it, but… it feels like my business now.
But well, she’s a protagonist in a thriller novel and all thriller novel protagonists are creeps.
But as boring as she was, reading Anna’s chapter make me notice right off the bat that there was something wrong with her, and I can’t shake that feeling. The thriller element; that feeling that there’ something dark and unsettling behind the good façade is there which proves how talented Kit Frick is. As mundane as the past chapters are (because they mostly speak about teen drama stuff), it inserts the thriller chill little by little which makes me the more curious to find out what exactly went wrong on New Year’s eve. It was a quick read and it was satisfying.
The podcast element though, was slightly of a disappointment. The podcast transcripts were written in a childish way and it came out all wrong. But looking back, I think it kind of suits because that said podcast was done by an amateur sixteen year old girl after all.
I think this is one of those books that could be a 5 star material had it been handled in a better way; a little tweak here and there and voila! It’s a total mind-fuck and half of the time I don’t even know what the hell is going on and which of the characters’ stories are true. I think it would do a little better if the author tried to insert more ‘foreshadowing’ leading up to the big reveal because I would’ve enjoyed it more had there been more foreshadowing and less mundane teen life. It was a solid 3 star read because even though I enjoyed how things wrapped up, I was kind of bummed with the past chapters. That extra 1 star was for chapter 36 alone because what the fuck?
thebrunettebookjunkie's review against another edition
5.0
Seventeen year old Anna Cicconi's life is a mess. She's spent far to long partying with her friends, blacking out, and not liking the person she's become. After she graduates high school, she lines up a cushy summer job as a nanny in the Hampton's. Her theory is that you have to be the best version of yourself to take care of a kid so she views the job as an opportunity to turn over a new leaf and work on being a better version of herself. Only, when she arrives in Herron Mills, she begins to be mistaken for missing teenager, Zoe Spanos. Zoe disappeared New Years Eve and the police haven't done their due diligence according to podcast host and family friend Martina Jenkins. With all the mistaken identity, Anna delves deep into the Missing Zoe podcast and a little detective work of her own and somehow. it ends with a confession, "I killed Zoe Spanos."
Kit Frick's, I Killed Zoe Spanos, is a must read for the summer. The setting, the characters, the plot all lend to spell binding hours of reading. I couldn't put it down. I was near the end of the book and still wondering how it was going to wrap up and answer all of my questions, which Frick does in an surprisingly, excellent way. Five stars!
Kit Frick's, I Killed Zoe Spanos, is a must read for the summer. The setting, the characters, the plot all lend to spell binding hours of reading. I couldn't put it down. I was near the end of the book and still wondering how it was going to wrap up and answer all of my questions, which Frick does in an surprisingly, excellent way. Five stars!
lyndsayreads's review against another edition
3.0
i really wanted to love this because the plot was so intriguing, i was very interested in the format of the story, and i've been hearing such great things about it. unfortunately, while i was initially hooked, things quickly started to go downhill. it definitely wasn't a bad book by any means. but for something that had such a strong start, this did not live up to its potential in the slightest.
so this book follows a girl named anna who gets a job as a nanny for a wealthy family in the hamptons during the summer before she starts college. when she arrives in the town, people start telling her that she looks very similar to a local girl who went missing the previous year, zoe spanos. strange things start happening, like she starts getting flashes of memory of zoe and people start acting really weird around her. before the summer is over, zoe's body has been found and anna has confessed to killing her.
the book is told in two timelines, the start of the summer when anna gets to the hamptons and the fall after zoe's body has been discovered. the summer timeline is told from anna's perspective and it's all about her coming to the area, meeting people, and starting to get these weird memories of zoe even though she's pretty sure they've never met. the fall timeline is told from another local girl, martina jenkins, as she tries to figure out exactly what happened to zoe. she hosts a podcast each week following the case and she gets very involved in the investigation.
i really liked the podcast element, especially listening to the audiobook because it had a full cast and really felt like you were listening to a podcast (similar to sadie by courtney summers). however, i don't think the podcast element was utilized to its full potential and i wish that it played a bigger part in the story. my biggest complaint with the book was that i didn't love the way the timeline jumped back and forth. i don't mind reading from two timelines. but the way the author spliced these two timelines together didn't always make the most sense. we'd get information in the present timeline before learning about it in the past and then it would jump back to the summer and you'd read it all over again. it made it less enjoyable because the shock factor was gone.
also, i think the book was trying to do too many things. between the mystery of zoe's disappearance (and eventual body discovery), the podcast, a secondary mystery that doesn't really come into play too much but is definitely there, and all the characters having so much going on in their lives, the book really wasn't long enough to fully delve into each thing. it all felt kind of surface level. and the mystery itself was predictable and completely unoriginal. i feel like i've read this story a lot before and so it was much less exciting to get to the end and think "yeah, okay i figured that out a long time ago."
it definitely wasn't a bad book by any stretch, but it also wasn't amazing. i wanted to love it more than i did and my expectations were pretty high. if you're new to mysteries and you're looking for a good place to start, this is probably a perfect book to get into. if you like books with mixed media, go for it. but if you're looking for a solid ya thriller, this is not it unfortunately.
so this book follows a girl named anna who gets a job as a nanny for a wealthy family in the hamptons during the summer before she starts college. when she arrives in the town, people start telling her that she looks very similar to a local girl who went missing the previous year, zoe spanos. strange things start happening, like she starts getting flashes of memory of zoe and people start acting really weird around her. before the summer is over, zoe's body has been found and anna has confessed to killing her.
the book is told in two timelines, the start of the summer when anna gets to the hamptons and the fall after zoe's body has been discovered. the summer timeline is told from anna's perspective and it's all about her coming to the area, meeting people, and starting to get these weird memories of zoe even though she's pretty sure they've never met. the fall timeline is told from another local girl, martina jenkins, as she tries to figure out exactly what happened to zoe. she hosts a podcast each week following the case and she gets very involved in the investigation.
i really liked the podcast element, especially listening to the audiobook because it had a full cast and really felt like you were listening to a podcast (similar to sadie by courtney summers). however, i don't think the podcast element was utilized to its full potential and i wish that it played a bigger part in the story. my biggest complaint with the book was that i didn't love the way the timeline jumped back and forth. i don't mind reading from two timelines. but the way the author spliced these two timelines together didn't always make the most sense. we'd get information in the present timeline before learning about it in the past and then it would jump back to the summer and you'd read it all over again. it made it less enjoyable because the shock factor was gone.
also, i think the book was trying to do too many things. between the mystery of zoe's disappearance (and eventual body discovery), the podcast, a secondary mystery that doesn't really come into play too much but is definitely there, and all the characters having so much going on in their lives, the book really wasn't long enough to fully delve into each thing. it all felt kind of surface level. and the mystery itself was predictable and completely unoriginal. i feel like i've read this story a lot before and so it was much less exciting to get to the end and think "yeah, okay i figured that out a long time ago."
it definitely wasn't a bad book by any stretch, but it also wasn't amazing. i wanted to love it more than i did and my expectations were pretty high. if you're new to mysteries and you're looking for a good place to start, this is probably a perfect book to get into. if you like books with mixed media, go for it. but if you're looking for a solid ya thriller, this is not it unfortunately.
bookishtea's review against another edition
4.0
Perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, I absolutely loved this book. One of my fav reads of 2022 so far and definitely has reread potential for me (as I don’t often reread books).
thelenjanae's review against another edition
4.0
Interesting concept and some fun twists. The end felt a little underwhelming, but I enjoyed the storytelling.
labarrec's review against another edition
4.0
I love me a modern retelling. I feel like it’s a very loooooose “retelling” of Rebecca, but the elements are there.
jamoeos's review against another edition
2.0
DNF. I just wasn’t that compelled by the characters. The plot had a lot of potential but I just couldn’t get into it.
cocoanut7's review against another edition
4.0
Kind of unbelievable at times, but still a gripping story. Weird but interesting.