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A review by ihateprozac
Last Seen by Sara Shepard
3.0
This book was a hot mess.
Was it an entertaining read? Yes.
Was it a satisfying conclusion? Yes.
Was it a good book? Not so much.
I enjoyed Last Seen as a book in and of itself. It was an enjoyable read and it brought Brett’s behaviour and the murders of the first book full circle. However, in doing so it manages to render Book 2 pointless. Literally. You could never bother with Book 2 and you’d be absolutely fine picking this up!
The foreshadowing in this novel was extreeeeemely heavy handed. All too often the characters see something curious, ponder it, and then find it’s insanely relevant two chapters later. This book is for teens, not primary schoolers. Give the reader a bit of credit.
As for the characters, Maddison was done such a disservice here and it bummed me out. She’s never been a huuuuuge contributor to the friendship group, but she might as well have been written out entirely, because she’s only ever called on when Shepard needs Maddison’s hacking knowledge to write her way out of the scene. I’m not here for it.
Also, FUCK SENECA. I understand what Sara Shepard was trying to do in showing Seneca’s descent into obsession, but her behaviour her was straight up toxic and is never addressed adequately. She gets to treat her friends and love interest like absolute garbage, doesn’t apologise properly, and the readers are supposed to be okay with that.
Don’t get me wrong, this was a really addictive plane read and kept me going on a long haul flight, but this was……..a mess.
Was it an entertaining read? Yes.
Was it a satisfying conclusion? Yes.
Was it a good book? Not so much.
I enjoyed Last Seen as a book in and of itself. It was an enjoyable read and it brought Brett’s behaviour and the murders of the first book full circle. However, in doing so it manages to render Book 2 pointless. Literally. You could never bother with Book 2 and you’d be absolutely fine picking this up!
The foreshadowing in this novel was extreeeeemely heavy handed. All too often the characters see something curious, ponder it, and then find it’s insanely relevant two chapters later. This book is for teens, not primary schoolers. Give the reader a bit of credit.
As for the characters, Maddison was done such a disservice here and it bummed me out. She’s never been a huuuuuge contributor to the friendship group, but she might as well have been written out entirely, because she’s only ever called on when Shepard needs Maddison’s hacking knowledge to write her way out of the scene. I’m not here for it.
Also, FUCK SENECA. I understand what Sara Shepard was trying to do in showing Seneca’s descent into obsession, but her behaviour her was straight up toxic and is never addressed adequately. She gets to treat her friends and love interest like absolute garbage, doesn’t apologise properly, and the readers are supposed to be okay with that.
Don’t get me wrong, this was a really addictive plane read and kept me going on a long haul flight, but this was……..a mess.