A review by aylea
Heiress Takes All by Austin Siegemund-Broka, Emily Wibberley

adventurous slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

 Olivia doesn’t like her father. He cheated on her mom, kicked them out of their luxurious home, made her mom work long, painful hours after an accident, and cut Olivia out of her inheritance. When her father is getting remarried, she considers it an opportunity to get revenge for everything her father has done wrong. She gathers a group of fellow high school students and one former teacher to use the wedding to steal millions of dollars from her father’s online accounts and right the wrongs against her and her mother. Unfortunately, the schemes of other people who also don’t like her father and her ex-boyfriend make things more complicated than she expected. 

 

Unfortunately, for a book that’s supposed to be based on high stakes and Oceans 11, I was bored for a significant part of the book. The concept is very fun, but I didn’t enjoy the execution. 

 

My biggest issue with the book is the characters. While I understand Olivia’s anger, especially with the mistreatment of her mom, it’s hard to get behind her reasons for stealing, lying, and generally treating people badly to get what she wants. She’s supposed to be fierce and intelligent, but I was annoyed with her for most of the book. She’s supposed to be a master heist planner, but she isn’t. Obviously, things need to go wrong at some points in the book to make things suspenseful, but she came across as clueless and unprepared during most of it. 

 

The other characters are generally either convenient or inconvenient. Their only traits are “helping Olivia” or “getting in Olivia’s way” mostly. It’s also uncomfortable to have a former teacher hanging out with them and supporting them in this illegal activity. I also didn’t think there was any real chemistry between Olivia and Jackson. I didn’t care that they were broken up, and I didn’t see what Jackson saw in Olivia when she was just conniving and mean. The only characters that seemed to have much development was Kevin and Olivia, and I couldn’t stand Olivia. 

 

There are a lot of plot holes, and you have to put yourself in the shoes of clueless Olivia in many aspects to think that 1. Any of this is going to work 2. Her father would just let her get away with this in the end anyway. It’s frustrating how much you have to ignore, and the number of twists got tedious instead of building excitement. 

 

If you just want a silly heist book and don’t need to care much about the characters, this could be a fun read. Unfortunately, it wasn’t for me.