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A review by emmuhlee
Perfection by Merphy Napier
4.0
Okay, I waited almost a full day after reading this to come here and write a review. I have so many thoughts and mixed feelings that I’m not sure where to start. I’ve decided after this day that I give it a 3.75 overall, rounded up to four.
Let me start by saying I watch Merphy on YouTube, and I wanted to support her as a self published author and buy her book. Knowing what she likes & dislikes in books makes this review for me all the more confusing, because she wrote in many tropes that she herself does not like. I myself don’t mind them, but that’s just something I’d like to point out.
Now, I have never read a self published book. I took me a minute to adjust to the book, the weird spacing, and the many typos. I did not mind though, because I understand it did not go through intense review. So it being self published will have nothing to do with the rest of my review.
I enjoyed myself reading this book. From beginning to end, I had a good time. The story was good and I like some of the characters. Ashton, however, had to be my least favorite. I’m okay with unlikable characters, but she was a bit too much for me sometimes. Nobody falls that much. And sometimes she was so smart and brave, and others she was dumb. When she decided to rush the Kwaad to release the prisoners with just her and Kaleb, knowing how bad of an idea that was, just didn’t match up with her character well. She went from not caring about Kaleb one second to be willing to just let go and die without him, which was just ridiculous in my opinion. I thought their relationship was cute, but it shifted quite quickly and unexpectedly. She spent her whole time cheating on David with Kaleb, because she couldn’t decide on who to pick, even though she knew David was not real. And Kaleb was okay with it at first, and then he was mad at her? He had to have known how confusing it all was to her. The love triangle really bothered me in this one.
Also, the plot seemed to develop too fast. I know Merphy likes plot driven stories, but this story needed some more world building for us to get a better idea into what Perfection was. I wish we had spent more time in Perfection before the plot started. The conversations in this novel also seemed to shift very quickly. One instance is when she was talking to Declan and she went from having a normal conversation to knowing he was the one who spilled all the details without so much as a thought from her head for the viewers to see.
The story of Perfection and how it came to be made some sense, but it was not quite as fully developed as I would have liked it to have been. Still thought it was an interesting concept.
This novel was quite noticeably a debut novel, but besides the issues I had, I really enjoyed the book and will be reading the next one. Knowing Merphy & her love for tragic endings, I’m anticipating a heartbreaking finale.
Let me start by saying I watch Merphy on YouTube, and I wanted to support her as a self published author and buy her book. Knowing what she likes & dislikes in books makes this review for me all the more confusing, because she wrote in many tropes that she herself does not like. I myself don’t mind them, but that’s just something I’d like to point out.
Now, I have never read a self published book. I took me a minute to adjust to the book, the weird spacing, and the many typos. I did not mind though, because I understand it did not go through intense review. So it being self published will have nothing to do with the rest of my review.
I enjoyed myself reading this book. From beginning to end, I had a good time. The story was good and I like some of the characters. Ashton, however, had to be my least favorite. I’m okay with unlikable characters, but she was a bit too much for me sometimes. Nobody falls that much. And sometimes she was so smart and brave, and others she was dumb. When she decided to rush the Kwaad to release the prisoners with just her and Kaleb, knowing how bad of an idea that was, just didn’t match up with her character well. She went from not caring about Kaleb one second to be willing to just let go and die without him, which was just ridiculous in my opinion. I thought their relationship was cute, but it shifted quite quickly and unexpectedly. She spent her whole time cheating on David with Kaleb, because she couldn’t decide on who to pick, even though she knew David was not real. And Kaleb was okay with it at first, and then he was mad at her? He had to have known how confusing it all was to her. The love triangle really bothered me in this one.
Also, the plot seemed to develop too fast. I know Merphy likes plot driven stories, but this story needed some more world building for us to get a better idea into what Perfection was. I wish we had spent more time in Perfection before the plot started. The conversations in this novel also seemed to shift very quickly. One instance is when she was talking to Declan and she went from having a normal conversation to knowing he was the one who spilled all the details without so much as a thought from her head for the viewers to see.
The story of Perfection and how it came to be made some sense, but it was not quite as fully developed as I would have liked it to have been. Still thought it was an interesting concept.
This novel was quite noticeably a debut novel, but besides the issues I had, I really enjoyed the book and will be reading the next one. Knowing Merphy & her love for tragic endings, I’m anticipating a heartbreaking finale.