A review by the_discworldian
Unforgivable Love: A Retelling of Dangerous Liaisons, by Sophfronia Scott
4.0
Popsugar 2019 Reading Challenge: A book with "love" in the title
This was A Good Book. It is well-written, well-constructed, detailed, evocative, and overall admirable. As far as a work of art goes, I give it two thumbs up. It just wasn't the book for me.
I prefer books where characters act like people, or characters act like they know how other people act. And this just didn't have that at all - with the exception of some of Mae's machinations. There's a scene where she thinks something along the line of "wow, men are idiots" and as far as this book went, I had to agree with her. I also could not get past my dislike of Val enough to have any sympathy for him at any moment. He's a manipulative, self-deluding creep, and the many scenes where he feels entitled to sex made me want to throw the book across the room, as did. His thoughts about Elizabeth and how she would react to this thing or that thing that he did, particularly towards the end, really made me wonder how I was supposed to believe he was so successful at manipulation, since he didn't seem to know how people react to things.
Reading this was kind of like watching an opera, both in scope and lack of credibility. So if you're into that, read on! If you're not, this may be one to miss.
This was A Good Book. It is well-written, well-constructed, detailed, evocative, and overall admirable. As far as a work of art goes, I give it two thumbs up. It just wasn't the book for me.
I prefer books where characters act like people, or characters act like they know how other people act. And this just didn't have that at all - with the exception of some of Mae's machinations. There's a scene where she thinks something along the line of "wow, men are idiots" and as far as this book went, I had to agree with her. I also could not get past my dislike of Val enough to have any sympathy for him at any moment. He's a manipulative, self-deluding creep, and the many scenes where he feels entitled to sex made me want to throw the book across the room, as did
Spoiler
the scene where he fucking rapes Cecily! Followed by the scene where Mae convinces her it wasn't really rapeReading this was kind of like watching an opera, both in scope and lack of credibility. So if you're into that, read on! If you're not, this may be one to miss.