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booksandbujos's review
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
This was a solid, standard thriller. The middle dragged a little at times, but the ending felt like a decently-paced climax. The reveal felt a little out of nowhere. I also don’t know if we really got closure on the sort of main mystery/ initial incident of the death of her mother. Was it actually natural? Was it supposed to be something more like the other deaths? Not entirely sure.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Death of parent, Murder, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Infidelity, Toxic relationship, and Violence
Minor: Car accident and War
tsalagitiffany's review
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Domestic abuse and Sexual assault
giasbookhaven's review against another edition
The pacing of this book is slow and the repetitive memory recall: Bones snap. Steel crunches. The sick thud of a skull slamming against the dashboard. Screams. A child cries that echos in nearly every chapter is no longer acting as an intriguing hook for the readers but an annoying directionless loop. I do not agree with Annie's mother's choice of words for her granddaughter but I do a agree with her observation that Tabby is spoiled and too American. Her sense of entitlement is normal for a teenager buy she lacks discipline and respect for her parents and authority. IF it was the goal of the author to make the daughter annoying, she succeed.
Annie's character is dealing with a secret trauma, on top of the loss of her mother and the psychological abuse she embedded within Annie throughout her life. Annie--from her Americanize version of her name Anh to her desires to be seen more than a first generation Vietnamese woman and a daughter of an odd, Vietnamese immigrant who made a name for herself at the hands of rich older white women who allowed her to take her art and make it a living. Or as a woman who married off well--both with her husbands looks, his money and status. Whether subconsciously or consciously, Annie is trying to hold on to this identity she has created for herself as a creative, a wife, and a mother.
In the same breath, readers are left to wonder if Annie's guilt over her mother's death is because she died at Annie's hands or if it has anything to do with something else entirely. I mean, I feel like I could go on and this is just 50+ pages into this book.
Annie feels shame for her:
Mother's compulsive hoarding
Her mother's strict views
Not having the same mother daughter relationship as her close friend
Over not wanting to take care of her mother
Over not being able to have a close relationship with her own daughter
I am sure the list goes on.
Annie's character is dealing with a secret trauma, on top of the loss of her mother and the psychological abuse she embedded within Annie throughout her life. Annie--from her Americanize version of her name Anh to her desires to be seen more than a first generation Vietnamese woman and a daughter of an odd, Vietnamese immigrant who made a name for herself at the hands of rich older white women who allowed her to take her art and make it a living. Or as a woman who married off well--both with her husbands looks, his money and status. Whether subconsciously or consciously, Annie is trying to hold on to this identity she has created for herself as a creative, a wife, and a mother.
In the same breath, readers are left to wonder if Annie's guilt over her mother's death is because she died at Annie's hands or if it has anything to do with something else entirely. I mean, I feel like I could go on and this is just 50+ pages into this book.
Annie feels shame for her:
Mother's compulsive hoarding
Her mother's strict views
Not having the same mother daughter relationship as her close friend
Over not wanting to take care of her mother
Over not being able to have a close relationship with her own daughter
I am sure the list goes on.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Mental illness, and Death of parent
Minor: Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Toxic relationship, and Car accident
rachelle_reads's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
4.25
First, the good: The author’s portrayal of OCD and the way she addressed refugee trauma and intergenerational trauma were well done. That’s what sucked me in. I couldn’t always tell what was real and what was a dream or false memory, and that works well is a psychological thriller.
This was going to be a 5 star book for me until the last 50 pages or so. Everything wrapped up too neatly.Three murders closed, with what evidence? And her relationship with her teenage daughter so quickly fixed? Please. I wish the author had taken time to finish all the storylines better, rather than using dialogue to explain it all away.
One other complaint has to do with the role of the psychiatrist. I appreciated how the author used this character to help us understand Annie’s OCD. But the psychiatrist did a lot of things that are quite unrealistic.You would never take on a client who was the spouse of a former roommate/boyfriend. I think I would have enjoyed the story more if Dr. Patel and the husband were conspiring together, but she was just a run-of-the-mill unethical therapist.
Overall, I enjoyed this book, and I look forward to reading more from this author as she hones her thriller writing skills.
This was going to be a 5 star book for me until the last 50 pages or so. Everything wrapped up too neatly.
One other complaint has to do with the role of the psychiatrist. I appreciated how the author used this character to help us understand Annie’s OCD. But the psychiatrist did a lot of things that are quite unrealistic.
Overall, I enjoyed this book, and I look forward to reading more from this author as she hones her thriller writing skills.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Body horror, Infidelity, Mental illness, Sexual violence, Violence, and Death of parent
Moderate: Child abuse
Minor: Fire/Fire injury
smagzisreading's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Murder
Moderate: Ableism, Body horror, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Blood, Grief, Car accident, and Death of parent
magyklyxdelish's review
dark
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Grief, and Car accident
Moderate: Animal death, Infidelity, Violence, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Gaslighting
Minor: Racism, Sexual assault, Police brutality, War, and Classism
minimicropup's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
It’s not bad, but it felt unfinished?
Energy: Visceral. Conciliatory. Woeful.
Scene: 🇺🇸 Mount Pleasant, Virginia.
Perspective: We follow an artist with a spouse and 13 yr old daughter in dual timelines (1980s-1990s to current day). Their mother lived in their guesthouse and has recently passed, and they are grappling with grief along with personal stressors. We also get a side story of a character at a hotel.
🐺 Growls: Too many dream/vision sequences. Unnecessary shock-value dog stuff. Awkward villain monologue in the middle of high-stakes ending.
🐕 Howls: Referring to incidents withheld from the reader for far too long. Insufferable characters over-musing. Feeling like we never get to know Annie.
🐩 Tail Wags: The overall idea of the story.
🤔 Random Thoughts:
An “inferring” style read. There’s vagueness and we can infer to create suspense, but it relies so much on that approach that I felt disconnected from the story.
Everyone is insufferable. The only character I was rooting for was the dog (don’t recommend).
Annia being annoying isn’t a hit against the book, because I think there was meaning for why. She’d obsess over non-important tiny details, then her mind wandered at a key point, and she’d miss the obvious. Given her condition, I think that was the point – she isn’t always rational or justified in her approach to crises. But she felt so one-dimensional.
This relied way too much on dream sequences to create spooks and suspense.
I prefer third person, but wish this wasn’t. It felt like it was originally first person, then someone went back and changed it. The narrator was like an annoying middleperson between the story and the character. It was lagging on page.
It’s almost Chapter 25 before ‘something happens’.
The ‘big bad’ describes everything In The Middle of A High Stakes Scene…Why?! And in this case they are screaming the evil plan into the air!
This entire plot felt like it was dipping a toe in multiple genres on a shallow level. Like the same tale told as a contemporary fiction, then literary horror, then popcorn thriller, then magical realism suspense. It felt disjointed, never really went deep (if there was depth or meaningful symbolism, I missed it), but was written like it was trying to be deep. It’s not a bad story, it’s just told in a way that felt like the same story through the same lens with slightly different filters on.
----
🤓 Reader Role: Middleman narrator. Interpreting first and conveying second, so it’s like they’re inserting meaning in the story without context.
🗺️ World-Building: Vapid. Both for the actual settings/atmosphere and for being in the main character’s mind.
🔥 Fuel: What do Annie’s dreams/flashbacks mean? What will happen with her marriage and relationship with her daughter? Driven by withholding, revelatory backstories, and dream sequences of cathartic release and philosophical insights.
📖 Cred: Plausible-ish suspended disbelief-ish
Mood Reading Match-Up:
- Dog barking. Door knocking. Dark bedrooms. Dust. Rice cooker. Bugs. Porch discussions.
- Generational trauma and second-generation immigrant experiences
- Contemporary fiction with flashbacks
- Musing, reflecting, overanalyzing character study at a distance.
Content Heads-Up: Loss of parent (in adulthood). Verbal abuse (from child). Controlling parent. Generational trauma. War (refugee; PTSD; brief mention/recall). Car accident. Alcoholism. Dementia. Racism (bullying, verbal abuse, tokenism, stereotypical assumptions by characters). Intrusive thoughts, losing track of time, rituals, contamination anxiety. Mysophobia. OCD. Loss of pet (dog, misadventure). Grief. Infidelity. Spiders. Toxic femininity/unhealthy gender roles. Hoarding. Alcohol use. Blackmail. Potential false accusation. Domestic abuse (attempted rape, physical assault).
Rep: Vietnamese. African. American. Second-generation American. Heterosexual. Bisexual. Cisgender.
📚 Format: Audible
My musings 💖 powered by puppy snuggles 🐶
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Mental illness, and Grief
Moderate: Alcoholism, Infidelity, Racism, Dementia, and Car accident
Minor: Domestic abuse and War
allena_inwonderland's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
4 stars 🌟 this book was so wild. You have an unreliable narrator, and a lot of mother daughter relationship toxic themes throughout the book.
There's representation for OCD and a very specific type, I can't remember the name rn. However Annie the FMC is triggered back into her old OCD habits after her mother dies.
There's multiple flashbacks to events Annie has memories of and they always end with You Know What You Did. So the whole time I'm reading this I'm thinking about what the hell did she do?! Haha.
I started feeling like wow this woman is really mentally unstable to the point she can't remember what even happened.
The ending threw me for a loop! I seriously didn't see it coming and that made this book so good. It's got a lot of triggers especially for immigrant parental relationship with their kid. There was some stuff that Annie went through with her mom that sadly I've seen so often in my own family with how women are perceived and should act especially in Asian culture. Please keep that in mind when going into this book.
There's representation for OCD and a very specific type, I can't remember the name rn. However Annie the FMC is triggered back into her old OCD habits after her mother dies.
There's multiple flashbacks to events Annie has memories of and they always end with You Know What You Did. So the whole time I'm reading this I'm thinking about what the hell did she do?! Haha.
I started feeling like wow this woman is really mentally unstable to the point she can't remember what even happened.
The ending threw me for a loop! I seriously didn't see it coming and that made this book so good. It's got a lot of triggers especially for immigrant parental relationship with their kid. There was some stuff that Annie went through with her mom that sadly I've seen so often in my own family with how women are perceived and should act especially in Asian culture. Please keep that in mind when going into this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Toxic relationship, Grief, and Death of parent
mysterymom40's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Gore, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Blood, Car accident, Murder, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Bullying, Infidelity, Racism, Sexual assault, Alcohol, and War
lovelymisanthrope's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I picked this up because it is the Literally Dead Book Club pick for June.
"You Know What You Did" follows a woman named Annie Shaw. Despite humble and often challenging beginnings, Annie seems to have the perfect life now with her wealthy husband and sassy teenage daughter. Somewhat unexpectantly, Annie's mother, a Vietnam War refugee, passes away, and Annie's life seems to be coming apart at the seams. People around Annie seem to be disappearing or turning up dead, and she cannot believe she is the catalyst for all of this, but she also does not know if she can trust her own mind.
This was a highly enjoyable mystery. Annie's story felt very relatable, but unique at the same time. All of the relationships in her life seem to be complicated and rife with turbulence. For example, despite loving her mother dearly, and appreciating the sacrifices she made for Annie, Annie and her mother had a complex relationship that became very difficult at the end. Annie knows what her mother would want, and she still hears her mother's voice criticizing her every day. This is really compounded by her increasingly difficult relationship with her own daughter.
I really enjoyed the idea that Annie was an unreliable narrator. Annie really struggles with some mental health issues, and throughout the book, Annie herself does not trust her own mind. I really enjoy this trope because it really forces the reader to trust their gut and analyze every angle of every situation.
The ultimate twist and resolution of this story was fine, but I was kind of disappointed. The person responsible for what was going on felt very cliche to me, and easy to predict. I was also left feeling lackluster about where Annie ultimately ended up. It was poetic in a way, but it almost did not feel authentic to her character.
Overall, I had a fine time with this debut, and I will be curious to keep K.T. Nguyen on my radar in the future.
"You Know What You Did" follows a woman named Annie Shaw. Despite humble and often challenging beginnings, Annie seems to have the perfect life now with her wealthy husband and sassy teenage daughter. Somewhat unexpectantly, Annie's mother, a Vietnam War refugee, passes away, and Annie's life seems to be coming apart at the seams. People around Annie seem to be disappearing or turning up dead, and she cannot believe she is the catalyst for all of this, but she also does not know if she can trust her own mind.
This was a highly enjoyable mystery. Annie's story felt very relatable, but unique at the same time. All of the relationships in her life seem to be complicated and rife with turbulence. For example, despite loving her mother dearly, and appreciating the sacrifices she made for Annie, Annie and her mother had a complex relationship that became very difficult at the end. Annie knows what her mother would want, and she still hears her mother's voice criticizing her every day. This is really compounded by her increasingly difficult relationship with her own daughter.
I really enjoyed the idea that Annie was an unreliable narrator. Annie really struggles with some mental health issues, and throughout the book, Annie herself does not trust her own mind. I really enjoy this trope because it really forces the reader to trust their gut and analyze every angle of every situation.
The ultimate twist and resolution of this story was fine, but I was kind of disappointed. The person responsible for what was going on felt very cliche to me, and easy to predict. I was also left feeling lackluster about where Annie ultimately ended up. It was poetic in a way, but it almost did not feel authentic to her character.
Overall, I had a fine time with this debut, and I will be curious to keep K.T. Nguyen on my radar in the future.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Bullying, Child death, Death, Infidelity, Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Medical content, Stalking, Murder, and Pregnancy