A review by avrilk
Verity by Colleen Hoover
2.0
Lots of spoilers. Continue reading at your own peril.
This book is weird. I'm not even sure where to begin.
There's a sleepwalking issue the main character has, which is so *un-fleshed-out* that it feels like a forced plot device to ensure there's a lock on the outside of the door. It serves no other true purpose. She tries to make a tie to the main character's mother and their strained relationship, but that also seems disconnected from the main plot/storyline.
I'm still not sure why the main character continuously tries to hurt herself in her sleep. The whole sleepwalking thing was made a much bigger deal in the book than it actually was. It also was left unexplained. Unexplained works in real life, but books demand tidy explanations.
There's a gruesome beginning to the story that doesn't seem to serve any real purpose except to drag the reader in. The first fifteen pages of the book could have been nixed with no change in the story's progression. I don't know; maybe more readers would quit the book early in without it since it would otherwise start with a boring publisher-agent meeting?
This unlikeable main character turns out to be a murderess. I'm not surprised.
The male lead turns out to be an unstable mess. Also a murderer. I'm not surprised.
These horrible characters hate the life they've created for themselves. Good. But also, poor Nova. Also, I'm not surprised.
I was waiting for interesting twists and turns. Turns out, no turns. I kept thinking the obvious was a little *too* obvious and was waiting for a neat and unexpected twist. Alas, the book remained alarmingly straight.
And I say this as the easiest person in the world to surprise with plot twists. I never see anything coming.
The characters all felt flat, two-dimensional. Even the main character. There were no real side characters, at least none that were fleshed out. Corey. April. Crew. Utterly forgettable characters, all of them, except how disturbing Crew is.
The writing wasn't horrible, but it definitely wasn't sophisticated either, and the misspellings and mis-used words kept jarring me out of the story. I bought this book at Barnes & Noble, but I swear it was self-published. I felt the lack of polish. The sentence structures were simple. Again, not horrible. But definitely not great either.
Overall, while I don't think this read was a complete waste of time, had I known what I was getting myself into I might have opted for other books.
This book is weird. I'm not even sure where to begin.
There's a sleepwalking issue the main character has, which is so *un-fleshed-out* that it feels like a forced plot device to ensure there's a lock on the outside of the door. It serves no other true purpose. She tries to make a tie to the main character's mother and their strained relationship, but that also seems disconnected from the main plot/storyline.
I'm still not sure why the main character continuously tries to hurt herself in her sleep. The whole sleepwalking thing was made a much bigger deal in the book than it actually was. It also was left unexplained. Unexplained works in real life, but books demand tidy explanations.
There's a gruesome beginning to the story that doesn't seem to serve any real purpose except to drag the reader in. The first fifteen pages of the book could have been nixed with no change in the story's progression. I don't know; maybe more readers would quit the book early in without it since it would otherwise start with a boring publisher-agent meeting?
This unlikeable main character turns out to be a murderess. I'm not surprised.
The male lead turns out to be an unstable mess. Also a murderer. I'm not surprised.
These horrible characters hate the life they've created for themselves. Good. But also, poor Nova. Also, I'm not surprised.
I was waiting for interesting twists and turns. Turns out, no turns. I kept thinking the obvious was a little *too* obvious and was waiting for a neat and unexpected twist. Alas, the book remained alarmingly straight.
And I say this as the easiest person in the world to surprise with plot twists. I never see anything coming.
The characters all felt flat, two-dimensional. Even the main character. There were no real side characters, at least none that were fleshed out. Corey. April. Crew. Utterly forgettable characters, all of them, except how disturbing Crew is.
The writing wasn't horrible, but it definitely wasn't sophisticated either, and the misspellings and mis-used words kept jarring me out of the story. I bought this book at Barnes & Noble, but I swear it was self-published. I felt the lack of polish. The sentence structures were simple. Again, not horrible. But definitely not great either.
Overall, while I don't think this read was a complete waste of time, had I known what I was getting myself into I might have opted for other books.