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I didn't understand one bit. I liked the involvement everyone had in Kelly's murder, but what the hell was that last line? I am so confused that I'm not sure what to say.
There are obvious resonances with the real world here – economic inequality, energy supplies, electoral campaigning – but this doesn’t take away from the delightfulness of the 1920s-inspired setting (it’s the US, so think Gatsby rather than Michael Collins). This is only the beginning of a thrilling adventure that includes venturing into ancient times such as the 1990s (where “the Rachel haircut is a time marker”) and grappling with the seemingly immutable rules of an unfair world. Joan desperately wants to save her murdered family, even as she is told it’s impossible: “Every monster goes up against the timeline...Everyone tries to change something at some point.” Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher Simon & Schuster for allowing me early access in exchange if an honest review. Even though the characters don't have a personality I did get attached to them eventually, but not really to Kelly tho. I liked the Irish setting and as a British reader that was very interesting. I thought that the way the characters are bought together by staying at a summer camp to learn Irish was very skillful and again, as a British reader, that is something I haven't had the experience of.
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There was a vague attempt at foreshadowing but it was so brief and so subtle you'd blink and miss it. It was not nearly enough - where were our breadcrumbs to follow? The action - and I use this term loosely - centres on a group of teens who are sent to a summer school in an old asylum to cram for their upcoming Irish exam. For the majority of the book they go to lessons and wander round this building, hinting at tension between characters but giving us little.
Sixteen-year-old Joan Chang-Hunt discovers she’s a “monster”, a member of one of the 12 great families of London with particular powers, including the capacity to steal time from humans. And that cute boy, incidentally, is out to kill her – he is the legendary “hero” determined to and prophesied to put an end to all of Joan’s kind. It was so addicting to read and the chapters flew by. I found myself tearing through it and near finishing it in a day. I was left reeling at the end’ – NetGalley – Nicola, Reviewer I liked the fact that Suze was in the "laundry room" this whole time. I liked Suze as a character, but I wish she was explored more; I found her very interesting. Another twist that I liked is in the epilogue. Can't believe I liked something from the epilogue! I enjoyed the use of the repetition to explain how everyone was involved in Kelly's murder. It worked okay. I really liked the fact that they were all guilty, in some way. Other than those two twists, I didn't quite enjoy the rest. Especially the asylum thing, since it wasn't a huge deal in the end. By the closing stages we had moved into a setting that made it clear we were going to see the death. However, by this stage I could have quite happily seen any of the characters in this position and not been concerned, and the actual description of the death was so choppily done that it felt like a ‘blink-and-you’ll-miss-it’ moment.It was so addicting to read and the chapters flew by. I found myself tearing through it and near finishing it in a day. I was left reeling at the end’' – NetGalley – Nicola, Reviewer
I love that this book made me question each of the characters and that it didn't give you all the answers, which just added to how chilling it was. I still don't know exactly what happened and who to blame. Or if there should be someone to blame!
The plot moves swiftly and neatly, as one would expect from this author (Mason is another pen name for crime writer Alex Barclay). But the characterisation feels thin, and this significantly lessens the impact of the dramatic events on the reader. Actually. Not just me. Because the author - I forget their name, sorry! - kept writing random things leaving me incredibly confused as to what was going on. If that makes sense, which it probably doesn’t tbh (TBH OLIVIA!!) but like… yeah. The setting was interesting, I guess; Irish language summer school. But the plot was nothing more than characters pottering about having mindless conversations while you were waiting for one of them to hurry up and die already - which didn't actually happen for the longest time!
No one was interesting. I'm more interested in what my neighbour's cat is doing than the characters themselves. I’ve been calling this book a murder mystery when it’s really a thriller (oops!) but there is absolutely nothing thrilling about this book. For me it wasn't always clear when you changed povs or it was sudden. It also didn't help that the writing style for every character was the exact same.The characters weren’t bland, so to speak, (what the hell does so to speak mean - yk when you just know when to put a phrase into your sentence but the actual phrase just doesn’t make sense? No just me?) I will say, however, if you’re in a reading slump - give this book a go. It’s easy enough to follow along to apart from when it isn’t (like that epilogue???) and it’s a relatively short book with big writing print so you can fly through it. (Not literally, unless you are Leia in Star Wars- like what was that about?) The characters were bland asf, the only character that wasn’t was Kelly, but Kelly was such an annoying bitchy character that I could’ve strangled her myself if I was in the story; LIKE SHE WAS SO ANNOYING AND RUDE TO ALL HER FRIENDS Rupert was honestly the best part of this book. Every time he appeared, I knew I was in for a good time. He always stole the show and I happened to laugh at some of his jokes. What worked best for Rupert was his LGBT experience, however. Sometimes, he would say that he hated being gay and, as a member of the LGBT community, I could relate. I could feel the fear he felt in coming out to his dad. I really couldn't like Kelly after what she said about his dad and his heart, or whatever. She made me really mad and I genuinely would have done the same thing as Amber. Rupert was a fantastic character and pretty okay for LGBT representation.
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