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A review by jazmin
Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth
4.0
this book… where to start?
this book left me very confused. impressed, in so many ways, but confused. (note: i loved it)
i think a lot of that is my own fault; i had been anticipating some kind of grand reveal, mystery book-esque, and so i was surprised when that didn’t happen. basically, at the end of the book, it felt like i was just as much in the dark as i was at the start.
in actuality, that isn’t true at all. plain bad heroines, and brookhants, its primary(?) setting, is filled to the brim little mysteries that the reader doesn’t know the answers to, but its kinda weird because you’re fully aware of that. the entire book pretty much has you on the edge of your seat, waiting for those discoveries to be made, which is why they don’t feel as surprising when they do come. it’s kind of implied.
so i suppose i didn’t feel like enough of the mysteries were solved because the whole time i was waiting for some big, final, climax moment to happen (which i totally fabricated in my head because at no point was this moment guaranteed by any means, this is more horror than mystery) and then when it didn’t, i was left with more questions than answers.
tldr: a whole lot of spooky stuff… but no explanation for it. (the contemporary storyline in particular.) or at least not one that was in-depth enough for someone like me who has a million questions about everything.
that isn’t to say this book was bad at all. in fact, i rather loved it. and maybe that kind of unsettling feeling was the whole point; the story is unsettling. not scary (imo), but… creepy. disturbing, at times. i just wish that more happened on page, rather than the kind of after the fact storytelling vibe that we got.
that being said, there were some great little tidbit connections to be made in this book, and i loved those. little moments here and there that you thought meant nothing but actually meant quite a bit. hard to remember? yes. a lot of the time i had to question if i was remembering things right. (the characters too. there were a lotttt of names to keep track of)
okay i need to stop writing now. i suppose i will finish this off with the comment that this was full of sapphic characters aka so so queer. slay (in the same vein: i’m so sure this book fails the reverse bechdel test HAHA)
this book left me very confused. impressed, in so many ways, but confused. (note: i loved it)
i think a lot of that is my own fault; i had been anticipating some kind of grand reveal, mystery book-esque, and so i was surprised when that didn’t happen. basically, at the end of the book, it felt like i was just as much in the dark as i was at the start.
in actuality, that isn’t true at all. plain bad heroines, and brookhants, its primary(?) setting, is filled to the brim little mysteries that the reader doesn’t know the answers to, but its kinda weird because you’re fully aware of that. the entire book pretty much has you on the edge of your seat, waiting for those discoveries to be made, which is why they don’t feel as surprising when they do come. it’s kind of implied.
so i suppose i didn’t feel like enough of the mysteries were solved because the whole time i was waiting for some big, final, climax moment to happen (which i totally fabricated in my head because at no point was this moment guaranteed by any means, this is more horror than mystery) and then when it didn’t, i was left with more questions than answers.
tldr: a whole lot of spooky stuff… but no explanation for it. (the contemporary storyline in particular.) or at least not one that was in-depth enough for someone like me who has a million questions about everything.
that isn’t to say this book was bad at all. in fact, i rather loved it. and maybe that kind of unsettling feeling was the whole point; the story is unsettling. not scary (imo), but… creepy. disturbing, at times. i just wish that more happened on page, rather than the kind of after the fact storytelling vibe that we got.
that being said, there were some great little tidbit connections to be made in this book, and i loved those. little moments here and there that you thought meant nothing but actually meant quite a bit. hard to remember? yes. a lot of the time i had to question if i was remembering things right. (the characters too. there were a lotttt of names to keep track of)
okay i need to stop writing now. i suppose i will finish this off with the comment that this was full of sapphic characters aka so so queer. slay (in the same vein: i’m so sure this book fails the reverse bechdel test HAHA)