pagesplotsandpints's reviews
2066 reviews

Read Completed 11/26/24 | 4 stars

This was a hard one to rate! I enjoyed the book all the way through, and the ending was positively thrilling for me, but I didn't love the reasoning behind everything. I wasn't even going to pick up this book, but I saw several social media posts about how it was a good audiobook and I'm a sucker for anything podcast-related for thrillers (even though I don't even listen to podcasts). Because of everyone raving, I was hoping for a *little* more audiobook production, but there are different narrators and podcast snippets for the reader to enjoy! 

The two main POVs worked well here. We get the main POV of Lindsey who is now 30 years old, 24 years after the disappearance of her older sister Jessica. Jessica was much older than Lindsey and was in college when she disappeared at Lindsey's 6th birthday party. After news pops up about bodies in a nearby lake, Lindsey begins to look into her sister's disappearance on her own, and a podcast looking into it as well spurs her to dive deeper. 
We also get Jessica's POV in the past, back when she was in college and before she disappeared. We see her life slowly falling apart, things that Lindsey never knew about because she was too young, and how all of these things created too many threads to follow upon her disappearance. 

I really enjoyed the writing style and just really clicked with the book! This was definitely a fun read, full of mystery, thrills, and kept me on the edge of my seat. The finale in this book was so exciting! I could not stop reading, my jaw dropped, and I was seriously hooked. It was something I haven't felt in a thriller in a long time! 

My only complaint was that I really, really didn't like the reasoning for everything that happened. I can't go into detail because it's an enormous spoiler, but if that ONE thing was changed, this would have been a five star book. I thought the reasons for the murders didn't quite make sense and I either needed some more detail, or less of something else. Something about it didn't really feel balanced and logical. I wanted this to be a five star book SO BADLY, but it was a fun read and I'm so happy the ending surprised me! It will definitely be a make-or-break moment for many readers though, I think. 

READ THIS IF YOU LIKED... 
- THE CHEERLEADERS by Kara Thomas

Read Completed 11/23/24 | 3.5 stars
These are just fun, light filler reads at this point. Thankfully this book was less goofy than a lot of the middle numbers of the series, and we FINALLY have some decision-making regarding the 31 book long love triangle. I love the characters but whew, that was a long time coming. 

I liked the mystery and the chase! It was easy to follow, as usual, and while it involved some goofy characters, it was still not too over-the-top.

Read Completed 11/21/24 | 3.75 - 4 stars, rounded up

I had no idea what I was in for picking up this series. I just knew that it was very well-loved and I couldn't tell if it was sci-fi or fantasy or both. What I got was very accurate according to many reviews in that it felt like THE NAME OF THE WIND by Patrick Rothfuss, but sci-fi instead of fantasy (oh, and this series will actually be completed). 

EMPIRE OF SILENCE -- and the rest of the series -- is a story told by Hadrian Marlowe. If you've ready TNOTW, you'll feel the similarity in that this story has already concluded and we're receiving it from Hadrian himself at a time when everything is long past. I actually didn't really love some of those asides when Hadrian interjects because I actually would have rather had some questions about if he ever sees some of these characters again, because at least twice he tells the reader "that was the last time I saw him/her", if not more. I guess there's no point in me wondering, but it does allow me to have a curiosity and let my mind wander. There were also a couple characters that I DID want him to see again, so I was a little disappointed sometimes. 

This book is not RED RISING. It's not action-packed or fast-paced. While it is science fiction and not fantasy, it has the long and meandering pace of many longer fantasy novels, like I mentioned THE NAME OF THE WIND and even at times The Stormlight Archive. (Oh, and DUNE, of course, for the epic sci-fi genre.) I really didn't mind that, thankfully, and I picked it up at a time where I felt like I was getting no character development from some other fantasy books I was trying, so I was all in with Hadrian to hear his story and spend all of this time getting to know him. My only character complaint was that Hadrian does go from place to place quite a bit in the book, so I wanted to spend more time with some of the OTHER characters so we could get a little crew going for him too. It does look like that will be more of book 2, so I'm looking forward to that. It got a little tiresome dropping everything that we just built -- characters, setting -- and just carrying on with character and taking the world-building deeper. 

The other issue I had is that while it's not plot or action heavy, there is a ton of world-building. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE world-building, but listening as an audiobook was a little difficult at times. I REALLY could have benefitted from a Wiki, but it doesn't really look like one exists for this series. I just wished I could have had a reference to go back and look at some of the names of planets / towns / families / characters while reading to refresh my memory as I went along so I could really dig in to what I was reading. I'll have to trust that Christopher Ruocchio will take me where I need to be as we continue! 

I definitely want to continue the series but may take a break for a while. I need a little break and I have some 1000+ fantasy books to read coming up here so I'm ready for some popcorn thrillers in the meantime! I look forward to checking out more of this series later!

Read Completed 11/21/24 | 2.5 - 3 stars
I knew this was a short but I was excited for this. The production actually really made it difficult to get into at first. It was a full cast audio production, but it was part full cast where the narrators each did their own voices, and then part of it was someone narrating all of the voices during a different POV. I'm not sure why that switched around but it was a little confusing to switch back and forth. 

The story itself was good, but for a short story, I found it a little frustrating at how many female voices there were. There were at least four different females to keep track of and since we didn't get to spend a lot of time with each one, I really felt like I was being bounced around frequently without getting to know any of them. 

The conclusions was a surprise to me, and that finally felt like a classic Liv Constantine vibe. The rest of the book was fine, but like I said, it just felt a little all over the place until I really started getting into it, but by then, it was too little too late. I think that's just often something that can happen in a short story -- it either works quickly or falls apart quickly. This wasn't as easy to connect with as I wanted, but I liked the popcorn twist in the end.

Read Completed 11/17/24 | 4.25 stars
Thank you to Macmillan Audio for this audiobook review copy!

Alice Feeney is always an auto-read author and I think BEAUTIFUL UGLY is one of her better novels! I loved the moody setting of a remote Scottish island and there's plenty of suspicion to go around. This book was readable from start to finish and immediately hooked me at a time where not a lot was grabbing my attention. 

The book is about author Grady Green, who takes a temporary leave/writing retreat to a remote Scottish island in a cabin lent to him by his agent in the hopes that he can get out of his writing slump. It's been a year since his wife disappeared while he was on the phone with her, and he has to assume at this point that she's presumed dead but starts seeing reminders of her when heading to Amberly Island. More and more odd things start happening on the island as its history makes itself known and Grady starts to find out that there's much more than meets the eye... 

I love a locked room mystery and despite having an entire island to roam, this is exactly what this book was. A tiny island with no tourists or visitors allowed, no phone or internet service, and even no cars makes things terribly exciting and suspenseful. With only 25 residents, when anything odd happens, you know it's someone on the island and just wonder what their motives are. Alice Feeney did a great job at bringing this island and all of its residents to life. At times, I forgot I was reading and could really picture everything that was going on, and I could definitely see this as a Netflix limited series like so many Harlan Coben novels. 

The pacing really picked up towards the end, and that's probably my only decent hesitation about loving this book. The beginning had its mysteries as we get to see (or don't see) Abby's disappearance on the page. The book skips to one year later as Grady's agent is arranging for him to head to the cabin on Amberly Island and things were still interesting, but do take a little while to set up. There are some suspenseful flashes here and there, and there are chapters where we see a past version of Abby before she disappeared, so there is still a lot going on to set up this thriller. I just wasn't as invested as I could have been to really amp up this rating, but it's all still solid! 

The ending was definitely more fast-paced, with things being revealed left and right! Most of the things I kind of saw coming by the time we got there, but there were a few missing pieces to tie everything together that really brought it full circle. Some of it was a little fast and furious and I wish that we had maybe spent more time on them earlier on so it wasn't such an onslaught of information all at once, but it definitely captured everything and tied up all of the loose ends -- including some things I had forgotten about! Some of it was maybe a little bit of a stretch, but hey, that's why it's an entertaining thriller novel. We don't always want to read about everything being a given because that's not exciting. 

Like some of my favorite thrillers, just when you think it's over, it's not! There was plenty of excitement to go around at the end, and it adds one more touch of darkness before it's lights out for this book. 

I'm so happy to have enjoyed this book and I think this is one of Alice Feeney's better novels for me! Definitely a solid thriller read. 

Read Completed 11/14/24 | 3 stars
The story was fine, the series was fine. I felt like it built up to a lot only to be let down, like what we were working towards the whole time was totally meaningless. There were some cool elements that the author played with here -- they didn't make sense, but they were fun if you looks past it... but it didn't really feel like a series finale. In fact, it actually kind of felt like bridge book to the finale. There's lot of action and really, the whole entire series is plot-driven so that just kept moving forward and forward. 

Ultimately the biggest disappointment of this series was that I didn't get invested in the characters enough. An issue I had in the second book is that the main characters aren't really ever in any real danger. I don't FEEL for them and get that feeling in my gut where I'm worried and want them to be okay. Anything that happens to them just quickly gets resolved. Some characters die but no one I even cared about. Kill your darlings! Shock us! Scare us! Eh. 

I felt like this in the previous books as well, but I felt like there were a LOT of elements that felt too similar to Brandon Sanderson. I wanted this to be a fun Sanderson read alike but it was... too alike for me in a lot of ways. Even more came out to play here and I couldn't help but recognize them. I get that when writing fantasy, there's only so many things you can do and some of them will come off feeling like other books, but I wanted this to stand out a bit more. 

I'd say this was an easier, lighter fantasy series, which is totally okay but not what I was looking for. There are still some issues, I think, on which the author could have improved to even keep it lighter but still have more depth. Unforatunely I don't think it's something I'd recommend but I am glad I finished the series because it's been a while since I've been able to complete a series. 

Read Completed 11/13/24 | 3.25 stars
I wasn't sure if I was going to continue this series by starting this book, but they are shorter fantasy novels and I've been wanting to complete a new fantasy series for a LONG time without being able to get into anything. I gave the first book 3.5 stars due to its ending, but STONES OF LIGHT suffered the same fate here when I was really hoping for things to get amped up. 

The thing I'm really missing here is development, on all accounts. In the first book, it felt more intentional like we were just giving an intro to the series and giving the audience time to get to know everything. What I was REALLY hoping for here was a deep dive into everything. Instead, the characters get no more development and are just pushed through the book by plot and the magic system doesn't get any deeper either. There are magical elements introduced that just appear out of nowhere to conveniently help the plot along. I still really don't know hardly anything about Threadlight except for the basics and I was hoping to explore that quite deeply in this book. I barely know why amber Threadlight is so valuable and I was hoping to see more examples of what it can do. 

I think the thing that frustrated me that really stuck with me is when a character gets notably injured. That didn't bother me, and actually, I liked it. It's a shock to the readers to do that to a main character and it really changes a person when they go through something like that. But they barely had to deal with it before magically getting healed. What! NO! It's a huge opportunity for character growth, for readers to care about this character and really feel for them. Instead, it's just quickly fixed like nothing happened. 

There are also some things that are a little TOO close to Sanderson's magic systems with Threadlight feeling awfully like Stormlight, the abilities of Threadlight similar to Mistborn magic systems, etc. I mean, it's hard to create a FULLY unique magic system and not have it feel like something of a major author, but at times, it feels a little too close. 

If these books were longer or if the series were longer, I definitely wouldn't have spent time on this or the third book, but seeing as the audiobook is only 11 hours long, I'm already starting book 3 to finish off the trilogy.

That being said, these books are a lighter fantasy read in terms of world-building, so if that's not something you really want in your reads at the moment, I would recommend them! To me, I see missed opportunity to draw fantasy readers in and to trust them that they'll connect with your elements, but I know we all have our personal preferences!

Read Completed 11/10/24 | 3.5 stars
This was a novella/short story in the "Forward" collection by Blake Crouch

Fun, but very short. I liked the concept and the execution. This was a little more thriller and less of the sci-fi aspect, maybe because quantum mechanics goes over most people's heads 😅 I did enjoy the read and the characters, for as short as it was.

Read Completed 11/10/24 | 3.25 stars
This was a novella/short story in the "Forward" collection by Blake Crouch

This was just okay! I enjoyed the concept and the story. It was a little bit quieter and I wish for just a bit more tension or suspense. The beginning dragged on for a little bit as subject X is waking up, learning more about himself, and coming around to everything going on. 

The ending could have saved it a bit, and I didn't mind it, but I wish there was one more bang to really cement this story into my head. A good read, but a little forgettable to me.

Read Completed 11/10/24 | 4 stars
This was a novella/short story in the "Forward" collection by Blake Crouch

This doesn't seem to be the general favorite of the masses but it's been the most engaging for me so far! I was pulled into this story the most and connected with the characters. I felt like there was adequate set-up, an intro to a sci-fi concept, and without even going overboard it led to a chilling near-future. I appreciated the vibe here and also enjoyed the audiobook narration.