WORST BOOKS OF 2023!!! 😾🐟 | Literary Diversions
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- čas přidán 16. 01. 2024
- In which I tell you guys my worst books of the year… sorted by some fun categories for your displeasure!
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📖 How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix: amzn.to/3SnrMYS
📖 Episode Thirteen by Craig DiLouie: amzn.to/3Sl8JhH
📖 Several People Are Typing by Calvin Kasulke: amzn.to/3Sjr6DI
📖 The Helm of Midnight (The Five Penalties) by Marina J. Lostetter: amzn.to/3S5xfBU
📖 You Should Have Left by Daniel Kehlman: amzn.to/3U4inqq
📖 Ordinary Monsters (Talents #1) by J. M. Miro: amzn.to/4aUby0B
📖 The Book of Accidents by Chuck Wendig: amzn.to/3HkTEpU
📖 The Companion by EE Ottoman: amzn.to/3vFRbEd
📖 They Came to Slay by Thom James Carter: amzn.to/3vFRm2l
📖 The Library of the Unwritten (Library #1) by A.J. Hackwith: amzn.to/3HkTpLN
📖 A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers: amzn.to/3RUgfi8
📖 The Roommate by Rosie Danan: amzn.to/48YbniK
📖 A Study in Drowning by Ava Reid: amzn.to/3HlMuBR
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Maybe next year you could do in order of how many pages it took you to DNF
The worst book I read in 2023 was The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell because it had so much sexual assault in it. I DNFed 9% in because the way that people were to get magical powers involved them being raped. There are so many 4 and 5 star reviews talking about how the book is so great but I refuse to look past rape in the name of "realism".
‘there were no vibes, there was only confusion’ 😂
Thank you for normalizing the DNF - I still get weird questions about my aggressive DNF habits! Love the list!
⚰The Pallbearer's Club by Paul Tremblay. I have never met a crew of such unlikeable characters, with writing that felt like it was a genuine struggle to get through, than this book. I was so mad that I tried as long as I did before I DNF'd it.
Thank you Lianne. Always appreciate your channel.🩷💚💙💜🩵Love to you and Harry.
🤦♀️ House of Sky and Breathe as we went from- oooh there is a ploy with stakes I'm Earth and blood to
Let's just run around being bad ass rebles who have no clue what we are fighting for, against, no stakes Bryce can do anything everyone loves her and yeah she paints her nails so deal with it. How did I go from actual emotional investment in thos chatacters and plot to no longer caring at all - oh I think the editors just forgot to edit the book this time! 🔥😉
Loved your categories, so much fun! 💜📚
I have finished so many more books now that I DNF and move on from books that aren't for me.
I feel like I have permission to DNF Ordinary Monsters now. I've had 12% left for months and I haven't felt able to read anything much else until I finish it. For the first time in over a decade I read less than 50 books last year but that was mostly due to life circumstances.
I did read more comics than usual so I think my "worst" will be the first 6 issues of the adaptation of Assassin's Apprentice, which lacked depth and felt unnecessary. I won't bother with any more of it. Can't think of an emoji for it though. Just 😑.
I see there is a fourth Sweet Pea book and I think I may be sadistic enough to read it 😂
I love listening to you roast books!
Ooooh okay I've heard nothing but hype for A Study in Drowning so it's good to hear some different thoughts!
I just looked back on my 2023 reads and surprisingly there's not one book I've absolutely hated. There were a few that just ended up being 2 or 2,5 stars because I was underwhelmed but that's it.
I DNF'd 67 out of 210. It was a suckfest. My absolute worst was Deep Sky.
Vampires of el Norte was my most hated book last year. I was soo hyped for a Mexican vampire novel it sounded soo good and dark and brooding… that book straight up catfished me. It’s a YA Historical Romance with negligent spooky creatures. 1 Star DNFd it at 60% and I want that time back.
Thank you for saving me from this book!
Weirdly, I just wasn't interested in Vampires of El Norte before, because I don't like horror books which is what I thought it was. But I love historical mystery with a slightly spooky aspect, so maybe I should try it!
@@the_reading_apprentice the spooky factor is minimal and a lot of folks really like the romance it’s very angsty and pining for each other.
This was such a fun watch! How To Sell A Haunted House is actually one of my favorites recently, and I thought it was really funny how it was the first one you mentioned. Still, I can totally agree with your comments on it. I even have another Hendrix book to read for this year, so hopefully that one will make a little more...sense, lmao. none of the other books were anything i enjoyed, but the beginning was a nice surprise! thx so much for sharing :DDDDD
So good!!😂❤
How to Sell A Haunted House THANK YOU! It was my first and last ever Grady Hendrix. I see the name hyped all the time and I thought this looked good. I had so many problems with it, but at least it did give me the unique experience of political puppetry in the wildest way!
"his writing has gotten worse". WHOO HOO! I am so glad I am not the only one who feels this way!!!!! I, too, keep trying and nothing has been good since Horrorstor. I quit as well. High five, you are the best!
I have not read any of these books but thoroughly enjoy watching your rants/opinions because they're always so well articulated ! ⭕🦹All of Us Villains was my most hated because it had so much potential I thought I was gonna love it but none of it made any sense and I questioned everything (in not a good way).
'A Scourge Between Stars' by Ness Brown was the worst for me. The science was so bad I ended up reading on to see how bad it would get. A nuclear reactor runs out of 'juice' cosmic purple aliens save the day...I was laughing so hard until I found out the author had studied astrophysics. Then I had to sit down for a little cry. 👽 👾 👽
🚫 What A Shame by Abigail Bergstrom was awful. Girl recovers from eating disorder by taking part in a ceremony that requires her to starve herself then vomit profusely?! Terrible and potentially harmful plot.
Unpopular opinion but my worst book of 2023 was seven husbands of Evelyn Hugo I just had a hard time vibing with this book I finished it to see why so many people liked it. 💃
I didn't like it eather but I didn't like Bone and Neddel,if that might deflect some of the🪓for ya😂
@@sharylgrangaard8484 I go back and forth weather to read that book.
The worst book I read in 2023 was......The Scarlet Pimpernel! I couldn't believe the 1980's Anthony Andrews film was SOOOO much better than the book! That hardly ever happens! 🏵
Have you ever heard of Hunger Pangs by Joy Demorra? It’s a paranormal vampire/werewolf romance that I think you would enjoy. It will eventually be poly too, but I think that will happen in book 2, which isn’t out yet because the author has a lot of health issues. But it has great disability rep, and the romance is very cozy. The author also published two versions of the book, one with explicit sex and one without, so readers could choose the level of spice they were comfortable with.
🧙♂️💔 Madly, Deeply by Alan Rickman. Not a book, just notes for a possible book. As much as I admire his acting work, I detested this boring, awful, money grab of a book put out by his estate.
😑
The worst book I read in 2023 was the poetry book She Wears Pain Like Diamonds by Alfa.
I'd kept seeing this around and people seemed to like it, but the writing turned out to be just bland and awful and I got the sense that the author was glorifying trauma in the sense of "suffering just makes you stronger guys" 💪❤️
My most hated book of 2023 was Remarkably Bright Creatures, which by all rights should have been delightful. So disappointed. 🐙❤ 👵❤ 🙎♂🤮
OMG you described "How To Sell A Haunted House" perfectly when you said "catfished". I thought someone had put the book jacket on the wrong book. Awful.
My worst book of the year was "You Shouldn't Have Come Here". She shouldn't have written that. What the hell did I even read? Was that a fever dream?
🍕🗡️🛹 I didn’t even have to think for more than a second on this one, although I did need multiple emojis since there isn’t a katana one 😂 edit: the book is Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
I read my first (and last💀) Ruth Ware - the turn of the key, my god, it was mind-numbingly bad
oh no, my daughter bought me this for Christmas, i HAVE to read it 😂🙈
@@emmawheeler4624 omg give it a go for sure! Maybe if it was a movie it would have worked better for me, there were just many things that erked me personally, but its popular for a reason! Hope you have a better time with it 😁
Gideon the Ninth because I would connect to it for a short period and then truly hate it a minute later. I forced myself to finish hoping that by the end it was worth all the upheaval but I can't say that it was.
omgoodness, the worst book i read last year was called the absolute book. it promised books, libraries, magic, a mystical land, and yes it had all those things, but at the same time it didn’t have any of those things. it was like 3 or 4 different stories wrapped round each other, plaited together to form a whole. i didn’t particularly like the characters. i kept forgetting that i was reading the same book. it was so disjointed, i kept thinking i’d skipped bits, it was truly awful, and sooooo loooooong. but i had to know how it ended. badly. i’m like what? where? how?!? honestly, waste of time, money, paper, and ink, no one should bother it was so bad 😂
🐦💀 O Caledonia by Elspeth Barker. It's set in Scotland and has We Have Always Lived in the Castle vibes. I should have loved this, but the grotesque descriptions of animal death/cruelty... I just couldn't. It's a short book but once I got to the pigeon I had enough.
Oh no... I just bought this book bc I also thought I would love it. Thank you for the heads up on animal cruelty.
A series i am reading or listening to is the wondering Inn by Pirate Aba - its very D&D themed and a long series
Last year, I had my quickest DNF ever.
The Birthing House by Christopher Ransom promised to be so good via the sypnosis. Within the first 30 pages, I had literally thrown it in the bin so no one else ever had to read that sexist tripe again.
😵The Paris Apartment by Lucy Foley.
I did not hate this book, I got through in one evening. What *AMAZED* me is how appallingly edited it was, for Foley to then list her many editors was laughable, and then for it to be a bestseller.
Oh I loved all the salt, thanks Lianne for the good time watching this 😃 I'm glad I didn't pick up A study in drowning...and You should have left sounds really really awful 🫣
One of my worst reads probably was 🔴🫅🏻 Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard...I really wanted to like it but nope nope nope 🙈
I ended up hate listening to a trilogy I’ve had on my shelves for over a decade. I think I tried reading the physical copy of the first one when I got them but the grammar was so bad I just couldn’t.
It was marketed as “chic-lit” but had several instances of rape and spousal abuse, no prep first time an*l etc. This author is now one of the most popular crime writers in Sweden.
🤬
I keep picking up books that are supposed to be empowering and enjoyable, but are really just thinly veiled diatribes on various topics. Really annoying.
I only DNF’d one book last year, I got about a third of the way through ‘Our Wives Under The Sea’ by Julia Armfield. I was finding it a chore to keep going and I didn’t care about the characters. Shame because I had heard great things about it.
I totally see it's! I found myself racing to get through Miri's part as fast as I could because I only cared for Leah's which I loved and it's made me feel so torn about it, butt I rarely see people talking about how philosophical/rambly and directionless it is.
Found family sci-fi ..... would love recs for that 👀(that are not the Wayfarers Series cause I've read and loved that one) - on another note, this was super entertaining for me 😄 literally lol'ed at 'written with a penis'
Lois Mcmaster Bujold's books
@@sorryman105 I was about to recommend them too!
I don't see people talk about the Silent Empire series by Steven Harper, or the Web Shifters series by Julie Czerneda. Also enjoyed A Pale Light in the Black by K. B. Wagers. Nathan Lowell's Trader Tales are some of the coziest, lowest stakes sci-fi books I've seen, if you have a high tolerance for not a lot happening. It can be justly described as about flee markets in space.😂
It's a standalone but Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot made my best of last year. Imagine a defense contractor escaping and using skills to give back with some piracy as well a lesbian romance with a Librarian. Then there's blackmail and the hero has to find truths and stolen goods to save a loved one.
I'm ready!! Give. Me. That. Salt 🧂🧂🧂
Not give the Grady Hendrix blurb writer a book contract comment ☠ those books are also not for me... but I'd already given up well before how to sell a haunted house 😂
Just checking that I'd already taken several people are typing off my list already because if not, it's definitely coming off now 😂
Ok I have a certain hunger out on ebook from the library...so I might just give it a little go but I'm going even harder on the DNFing this year so I'll let you know how that goes 😉
All of my most disappointing reads or DNFs were super beloved books so I'll just give you one of these emojis 🤷♀️
My Worst read was a book by Conrad Bauer called The Priory of Sion: Hox, Conspiracy, or Secret Society? I read a lot of books and articles in the ancient and medieval timeframes particularly dealing with Christianity and Judaism (as these are the areas I focused in for my Bachelors and Masters). I had to stop at 33% because it was not delivering the intended argument and the author criticized others for things they could have done better (and he didn't do at all, and should have)! By 33% I was feeling like Bauer needed to go back to undergraduate history methodology and historiography!
I dnf'd Ordinary Monsters and The Library of the Unwritten for the same reasons you mentioned.
🏡Remember Love by Mary Balogh, who is usually a reliable historical romance author for me, was THE WORST and my first 1 star for her. The inciting event in the blurb doesn't happen until 40% in, and not a single character has a reasonable reaction at the moment or after the time jump (which was too long after). Like if that entire section had been limited to an opening chapter to show the naivete of the main character, and then he came back to the fallout after achieving even a modicum of maturity, it would have been at minimum a 3 star. But instead the first half dragged and then too much got shoved in the second.
I see where you are coming from with The Roommate. This is not me trying to change your mind, just my thoughts on the book. I did enjoy the banter between our two main characters because I felt he was pushing her to examine thoughts and ideas she had been forced feed by her family. Basically he is the author's narrative device to speak on classist themes in American society. I didn't object to the scene you described mostly because I felt we know that both characters are interested in each other physically but putting up road blocks mentally to justify not being together. But I also go into romance novels with the world view that this is a fantasy parallel universe were all actions are presumed innocent and at face value until other wise told different by the author. Some romantic things can also be highly creepy or worse depending on motivation. I didn't read it as him purposely being creepy but caught in a moment that went farther than he meant for it to go, so then he tried to reestablish boundaries. I didn't feel his motivation was to gas light her, but just didn't know how to communicate his feelings. Which she didn't either. They both were constantly giving mixed messages through out the whole book. I liked it but wouldn't say it was a perfect romance.
I felt the same way about The Library of the Unwritten! It seemed so up my alley, and early on, I thought it might be okay, but nope - it was such a letdown. I listened to the audiobook and kept spacing out because I just didn't care. It should have been a dnf, but I couldn't admit that a book that seemed written for my tastes was just so blech.
One of my worst books of the year is A Cabin at the End of the World by Paul Tremblay. I should've DNF'd the moment I stopped caring about what happens to the world. Got to the end and wished I had followed through with the DNF.
My worst book of 2023 was 🤬because it just makes me irrationally angry any time I see it being recommended. And that book is The Pucking Wrong Number by CR Jane. For poly romances, I would highly recommend the Shades of Trouble series by Kitty Cox. It is a four book series but the books read really quickly and the relationship is a true poly relationship between all the characters.
🙄the biggest eye roll for Grave Expectations by Alice Bell🙄
My worst for 2023 was The Things We Do To Our Friends 😴. I really wanted to like it but it just bored me, I think I managed a good 60% before I finally gave up and DNF'd. I'm starting to realise that as much as I like the sound of it Dark Academia just isn't for me.
I read Episode Thirteen with the book club, but I actually really enjoyed it, I found that the first half dragged a little but when I got over halfway I really enjoyed the change of pace 😃
Holiday triplet surprise. Poorly done trope I love. Bashing a birth mom (who is 19 and decides to give triplets up because its a lot when you are single) and a mystifying interpretation of healthcare system
Harlequin? Those are so so judgemental. I hate read and recorded a podcast episode with my husband about them.
@jesschecksout yes. It was a Harlequin. I usually enjoy them the way I enjoy a hallmark movie. Nothing special but gets the job done.
Not that one though.
@@janenightreadsandwrites223 I usually find them enjoyable but babies and Christmas never seems to work out well.
I was also so disappointed in A Study In Drowning... I gave it 3 stars.... But in reality it was probably a 2/2.5
💛💛💛
I DNF How To Sell A Haunted House, which I got from the library. Though in many ways it's not a haunted house, I always thought of it as being haunted by the toxicity and resentment of the family because they were so messed up as a family. Not by actual ghosts or demons, which would have been a lot better. My two worst books were Viviana Valentine Goes Up River by Emily J Edwards, a 50s female PI who acts like she's the best PI since Sherlock Holmes when she was insanely stupid and missed OBVIOUS clues. I had to sit through an insta romance with no build-up and zero chemistry. The Only One Left by Riley Sager, was just stupid, I was seduced by the title and cover, but I know Sager's writing just isn't for me. Though easy to consume like movie popcorn with lots of butter, It just felt immature, silly, and ridiculous twists.
My absolute worst one was 'Priest' by Sierra Simone.
There was a compilation of three novellas, and one of them was So. Bad. Luckily the other two were great, but whew.
i was very interested in the roomate until she started to watch his content and i knew it was deep into secondhand embarrassment territory for me... yeeted
😑😑😑 - Haunting Adeline by HD Carlton. It was soooooooo boring! I want to read Ordinary Monsters!
I have two 💩 books that are neck and neck for my worst reads of 2023 - Paperback Crush by Gabrielle Moss made me actively angry, I don't know why she chose to write a book about that particular subject when she had so much disdain for it. The followed closely by the 7 1/2 deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, I know a lot of people love this book - and that's great for them, but looking at the review I gave it in my journal it was a lot of "f this book", "I hated this book so much", "so incredibly dumb", and if I have to hear him describe how fat the character of Ravencourt was one more time I was going to yeet my kindle across the room. Luckily the year was filled with more winners than losers 😆
👿🏠 Devil House by John Darnielle. A haunted house story written like its a true crime exploration of the history of both the house and its author? Sounds right up my alley but instead it was the dullest most unforgivably pointless read. The protagonist was so milquetoast and just mediocre. The only silver lining to the whole reading experience was that it was from the library and so I wasted my time only not my money.
Your issue with Grady Hendrix is my issue with Darcy Coates. The premise is so good!! An hour later...wtf is this?!!!?!?
Funny enough I read the second Jane Doe book, Problem Child, last year and it made my best of list. Jane is grey and morally questionable but she has things she believes in and trusts. Don't mess with those.
Worst was Corrine which I saw everywhere. Oh, the raging I did. Fundie smexy without any good character arc or development. Also didn't buy the romance. At all.
I’m so glad I didn’t end up buying Episode 13!
I had a bunch of meh books last year, but only really one that was truly objectionable - Storm Peak by John Flanagan, one of his few adult books. It was a crime novel, but I hated the bad plot with many plot holes, the absolutely despicable portrayal of women, and a laughable ending. I ended up hate reading it and enjoying the process so much more.
The worst part for me is that I live his middle grade novels, and now that I've seen his opinion on women, I've noticed it bleeding into his middle grades too (luckily not quite as bad as the adult novel though) 😢
I DNF'd The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones which had the most unnecessarily graphic slaughter of animals I have ever read in my life and then acted like the people who did the murdering didn't deserve exactly what happened to them 🤢
I mean.... the numero uno that makes me rage when everyone loves it is The Push but you know my pain with that one. My newest pile of poo was Black Sheep! I was HIGHLY anticipating it and it catfished the hell outta me as a cheesy D-list horror flick with none of the fun camp. It made me so mad! I'm still looking for a good thriller/horror about religion...
🇯🇵⚔️ I don't know why I keep reading AJ Sherwood books when so many of them dissapoint me. Fourth Point of Contact should have been my last attempt because it was the worst I read in 2023. I have lived in Japan for years and the main character coming from a pseudo Japan background in a fantasy setting was terribly stereotyped. Coupled with a duo that were pining for each other even though it everyone saw it as instalove and questionable world building, I should've DNFd.
I also should've learned my lesson because I read Dealing With Mapinguari and Dogged Engineers which was equally as bad but set in Brazil and since I'm from Brazil, it hurt my soul to see the geographic inaccuracies and blatant pro-colonialism. What was I thinking?
Anyway, I just wanted to say that I really loved this video. Thanks to your spoilers of Several People Are Typing, I'm taking that off my TBR. Now I'm going to go watch your worst books of previous years
🍊 Priory of the Orange Tree
Did you read The Southern Bookclub's Guide to Vampire Slaying? If so, didn't you like it? HOW?
Also, I adore the category written by a penis, and am throwing flowers at you for specifying it applies mostly to cishet men. I'm a gay trans dude, and I find it so off-putting. In the same vein, sometimes it's really awful to read MLM romance by cis women who identify as straight, because it's clear it's nothing more than a fetish to them, and they don't fully understand the mechanics.
Also, I've been subscribed to you apparently for I don't know how long, but you just popped up on my page, and I didn't remember you. I'm glad to rediscover you. You have well thought-out reviews, you're funny, you're earnest, and you seem like a pretty good ally (if you're not queer yourself). I hope to see more from you!
🍚 pretend that’s a bowl of overcooked plain, unseasoned oatmeal. I read 278 books in 2023 and of those, only 22 were any good. The rest was a sea of sameness. So nothing horrible (that was in 2022), but a lot of nothing to hang on to. Some of your worst reads are on my physical book TBR which makes me kinda sad, but live and learn.
I haven’t read a single one of these 🥳
🥂Beautiful Little Fools by Jillian Cantor is a retelling of The Great Gatsby through the perspective of three women and it’s part of the terrible trend of “correcting” male narratives by empowering the women around them with voices. Only, without considering why those women were written the way they were in the first place. It ignored the whole point of the story, stripped all the female characters of autonomy and accountability, and turned the original plot into a murder mystery. In the process introducing an irrelevant “romance” arc which undermines the romantic idealization of the titular character, decimates Gatsby himself (who’s more an idea/symbol in the original book than an actual man), and basically ends itself half way through but persists to go on whining about the horribleness of men.
Made me really wish I had some of that illegal liquor to get through it. Or possibly to forget I ever read it.
There were a few books that I really disliked, but I’d have to say my worst in 2023 was Blue Ribbon Romance by C. M. Nacosta. It undid all of the good things about Morning Glory Milking Farm and added in a bunch of other awful things. So poorly written and retroactively made me dislike all of the other books I’d read from the author in the series. Gave me this face 🤬 all day long. And I think the audiobook was less than 5 hours so that was a lot of hate to pack into a short amount of time. Thankfully I borrowed it from the library but even getting it for free was paying too much
🦈🦈I didn't read anything you disliked so I can't commiserate with you. But I did read Jaws for a book club and it was so GROSS. Just the misogyny and racism and bleeeh. It was AWFUL.
I haven’t read A Study in Drowning yet but now I don’t want to…
My worst book of the year was The Invisible Life of Addie Larue👿😴it was poorly written with one incredibly boring and forgettable mc and the other mc was just a truly horrible person. I waited years to read it and thought it was going to be a new favourite… don’t understand why it’s so beloved😥
The House Across the Lake 🤔🧐🍷🥃🥂🍻❓🏊♀️🤦♀️
🎮 Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow.
I haven't read any of the books on your list but trust me, after hearing the way you described them, I won't be reading them. Thank you.
🍩 So Lucky by Dawn O'Porter. Absolutely awful!
I haven't read A Study in Drowning yet but honestly it's refreshing to hear an opinion outside of the hype so I know what to expect.
My worst of the year was The Warden by Daniel M. Ford. 💀 It was my most anticipated read and let me down in literally every way. I hated the magic, the worldbuilding and most especially the main character. 😂
🤬I hated A kingdom of flesh and fire. The first one in this series was terrible, but the second….. I’m so attracted to you, but I hate you, but I love you, but I don’t trust you etc. And they never communicate!!!!!!!
Great video as always! 😁 My worst book: 💩🤮 Adam by Ariel Schrag. It’s transphobic af, with racism and antisemitism thrown in - wouldn’t recommend 👍🏻
I dnfed How to Sell a Haunted House, but not because I hated it. I'm just very touchy about parental death right now and somehow did not put two and two together when reading the synopsis.
I really liked the one Grady Hendrix novel I've read, which I think might have been his first. (Horrorstor)
🤱🧑🎄
👿 Most definitely Throne of the Fallen. It's cheap, disgusting and an overall terrible book. It's YA but porn. Damn I hate it. I also bbought a beautiful special edition and that makes me more mad...
Here is an in depth copy of my GR review, with the appropriate amount of swearing:
Throne of the Fallen or The Book of Tropes: Porn Edition, now with demons!
Please give 2005 its tropes back.
Possessive and unidimensional ML
Damsel in distress and different from all the other girls FL
Rapey and power hungry antagonist
The FL’s self respect left the chat sometimes during chapter 3 and killed itself during chapter 51
The demon princes sound like edgy teenagers who have just finally been allowed to use the words “fuck” and “cock”
The possessive “You are mine!” ML telling the antagonist that “women belong to themselves and not anyone else” is the most pathetic attempt at feminism that I have ever seen from an author who has her FL be rescued by the ML at least 4 times.
Attempted rape is the cheapest and most unimaginative way to show that someone is a villain. And it happens multiple time. For shame!
I can make a list of tropes as long as my arm and none of them are good.
It’s like Twilight, Bridgerton and ACOTAR had a love child but in all the tropey ways.
It’s basically a YA but with sex scenes. So many sex scenes it’s like the author is making up for all the missing sex scenes that her previous books didn’t have.
And a reveal at the end is the cheapest reveal in the history of reveals, dear gods I hate that trope with a passion.
The plot didn’t just take the backseat, it took a different car, which then crashed and burned.
TL;DR: it feels like every YA ever written but the pornographic version. At least I have now found my worst book of the year. Also, fuck this book.
Ok that sounds really awful, one book less on my want to read list then 😅
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😠😠😠
It was 2 books both by Paula Brackston. She'll never disappoint me again.
my worst was either 🧩 The Secrets We Keep by Deb Loughead with no real secrets, no big reveal/twist, and autism-specific ableism that i should have known there'd be, or 🥀We Light Up the Sky by Lilliam Rivera with flat characters and nothing really happening
🫤”Irish Witchcraft from an Irish Witch” by Lora O’Brien is a book I had to put down after about 10 pages. I’m sure there are good aspects to this book, but I couldn’t get over how judgmental the author seemed.