A review by bethboo
Daisy Darker by Alice Feeney
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I really thought that I wasn't going to like this book. The first 2 hours of it had me second guessing whether I wanted to even read it. Maybe I would have felt different if I had ever read Agatha Christie or even knew the story of And Then There Were None. Cause apparently the entire book is a nod to that. But it really pulled me in when we started to get to know the family member. The home movies were always my favorite. The narrator was phenomenal, sounding choked up and adding tears. She was great.
All the characters were horrible people and very cruel in a realistic way. They felt like real people, like I could turn around and google their names and see them in the flesh. That could partly be attributed to the narrator and her success in telling the story but that's one of the main reasons that I liked this book.
The ending. It was horribly unsatisfying and is really coloring my thoughts about the book even though I'm trying not to let it because I enjoyed the twist and turns and writing right up until the last hour or so.
Ghosts? The HUGE plot twist is...a ghost?? That's like so weird? Like this isn't a fantasy novel or something magical. She was just dead...like huh?? SO fucking disappointing.
It was a big shocker to learn how Daisy had died and it really fit in with the other characters. However, Trixie and Nana being the killers?? *eye roll* You think a tiny 15 yr old girl and an aged 80 yr old woman could move 3 dead bodies of grown adults? Like come on.
And the whole game of killing every hour on the hour and the poems, idk it just felt a little too sadistic and twisted for Trixie and Nana. Especially since their motivation was love. Like I could have believed a crime of passion by Nana, because of her anger at being the last one to know, but the game doesn't really feel realistic for them.
All the characters were horrible people and very cruel in a realistic way. They felt like real people, like I could turn around and google their names and see them in the flesh. That could partly be attributed to the narrator and her success in telling the story but that's one of the main reasons that I liked this book.
The ending. It was horribly unsatisfying and is really coloring my thoughts about the book even though I'm trying not to let it because I enjoyed the twist and turns and writing right up until the last hour or so.
Spoiler
Ghosts? The HUGE plot twist is...a ghost?? That's like so weird? Like this isn't a fantasy novel or something magical. She was just dead...like huh?? SO fucking disappointing.
It was a big shocker to learn how Daisy had died and it really fit in with the other characters. However, Trixie and Nana being the killers?? *eye roll* You think a tiny 15 yr old girl and an aged 80 yr old woman could move 3 dead bodies of grown adults? Like come on.
And the whole game of killing every hour on the hour and the poems, idk it just felt a little too sadistic and twisted for Trixie and Nana. Especially since their motivation was love. Like I could have believed a crime of passion by Nana, because of her anger at being the last one to know, but the game doesn't really feel realistic for them.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Emotional abuse, Child abuse, Bullying, Gaslighting, and Grief