A review by alyssadorn
Ruin and Roses by Deanna Ortega
2.0
I kept waiting for this book to make sense, come together, or have a coherent plot, but it never did. I read the Kindle version, though, so maybe it’s accidentally a version from the middle of the editing process? My main issues were:
1. The writing is almost incomprehensible. About once a chapter I’d have a “that word doesn’t mean what you think it means” moment and have to guess what the author meant. Almost every third paragraph the sentence structure was so abysmal I couldn’t parse its meaning after multiple read-throughs (at least to start, it got a bit better later but still happened often enough to be distracting); some examples below.
2. The character development and motivation was almost nonexistent and didn’t make sense when the author tried to show some growth. For example, our MC Jane hates all her siblings, including a sister who doesn’t seem to do anything but support Jane— where’s the motivation for her hatred? Then later when the author tries to show Jane coming to like/understand said sister, it’s all told and not shown, and the “development,” if it could be called that, feels unmotivated and trite.
3. There’s very little plot or action. It feels haphazardly thrown together.
4. The author tells a lot instead of showing.
5. The relationships were unconvincing and lacked chemistry except for during sex (for the romantic relationship(s)). I just didn’t believe Jane could meet a stranger in a terse situation and instantly trust them and become their friend, or that Jane and her sister were so adversarial, or even the tension the author tried to write between Jane and Liam.
The only scene I truly enjoyed was the singular spicy scene that seemed like it had gone through more rounds of editing than the rest of the book, as it was better written and even seemed to introduce some mystery (that was then left unaddressed for the rest of the book).
Also, there are no answers given or even bread-crumbed to the few mysteries we are given. I feel like the author needs to give us something by the end of book one, like the answer to a smaller mystery that could feed into a bigger one in book two, rather than making it feel like book one is just unfinished.
Writing style examples:
-“If my father noticed my sister’s act from the erected dais to the side of the vaulted room, he didn’t show it. Which showed me he didn’t. Otherwise, he did and couldn’t care.” - clunky phrasing typical of this book’s writing style.
-“The gesture showed how little he meant his statements but also proved he might.” - how is this a full sentence??
-“Blair’s simple structures appeared to have never had much time in the sea or too much.” - what??
-“As my blood dripped into my fur-lined slipper” - When did she get cut?? I reread the chapter and it’s never mentioned. I can guess when it happens, but it’s never mentioned before this, not how or where she was cut.
-“childish and evident as it was to pretend I didn’t know…” - evident?? Wrong word choice, probably meant “petty” or “common” (as a synonym for the slang “basic”)— “unimaginative.”
1. The writing is almost incomprehensible. About once a chapter I’d have a “that word doesn’t mean what you think it means” moment and have to guess what the author meant. Almost every third paragraph the sentence structure was so abysmal I couldn’t parse its meaning after multiple read-throughs (at least to start, it got a bit better later but still happened often enough to be distracting); some examples below.
2. The character development and motivation was almost nonexistent and didn’t make sense when the author tried to show some growth. For example, our MC Jane hates all her siblings, including a sister who doesn’t seem to do anything but support Jane— where’s the motivation for her hatred? Then later when the author tries to show Jane coming to like/understand said sister, it’s all told and not shown, and the “development,” if it could be called that, feels unmotivated and trite.
3. There’s very little plot or action. It feels haphazardly thrown together.
4. The author tells a lot instead of showing.
5. The relationships were unconvincing and lacked chemistry except for during sex (for the romantic relationship(s)). I just didn’t believe Jane could meet a stranger in a terse situation and instantly trust them and become their friend, or that Jane and her sister were so adversarial, or even the tension the author tried to write between Jane and Liam.
The only scene I truly enjoyed was the singular spicy scene that seemed like it had gone through more rounds of editing than the rest of the book, as it was better written and even seemed to introduce some mystery (that was then left unaddressed for the rest of the book).
Also, there are no answers given or even bread-crumbed to the few mysteries we are given. I feel like the author needs to give us something by the end of book one, like the answer to a smaller mystery that could feed into a bigger one in book two, rather than making it feel like book one is just unfinished.
Writing style examples:
-“If my father noticed my sister’s act from the erected dais to the side of the vaulted room, he didn’t show it. Which showed me he didn’t. Otherwise, he did and couldn’t care.” - clunky phrasing typical of this book’s writing style.
-“The gesture showed how little he meant his statements but also proved he might.” - how is this a full sentence??
-“Blair’s simple structures appeared to have never had much time in the sea or too much.” - what??
-“As my blood dripped into my fur-lined slipper” - When did she get cut?? I reread the chapter and it’s never mentioned. I can guess when it happens, but it’s never mentioned before this, not how or where she was cut.
-“childish and evident as it was to pretend I didn’t know…” - evident?? Wrong word choice, probably meant “petty” or “common” (as a synonym for the slang “basic”)— “unimaginative.”