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zetiacg's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
raoulgonzo's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
suzzeb22's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this book. She has a very clean style of writing and kept me intrigued throughout the novel. Very enjoyable. You can sense something horrible is abut to happen all through the book. I would recommend it.
albameedinaa's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
amberwallace2012's review against another edition
3.0
Started out a little slow but picked up a few chapters in.
lucias_igloo's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
shimmery's review against another edition
4.0
To begin with I loved this book and found myself thinking about it a lot between reading. I loved the writing style and the detail, and liked a lot about the main character. Nameless to us and painfully shy, she spends all her time daydreaming about possible situations, imagining what people say when she isn’t there to hear, speculating about the future. Of course when she becomes a second wife to a widower, the absent first wife becomes a fixation for her imagination.
It’s very clever how most of the first half of the book isn’t things that actually happened, but rather describes things the narrator imagines. The whole plot is very internalised, and that makes it different and I thought worked well.
Rebecca, known only to the narrator through stories people tell her, in which she is beautiful, clever and gregarious, becomes hugely intimidating and a standard the narrator feels she will never meet. She worries her husband will never love her because she will always look poor in comparison. Yet when things turn out to be not how they first seemed and she finds out her husband actually hated Rebecca and in fact murdered her, the narrator’s first reaction is to be relieved thinking that he didn’t love Rebecca after all! I’m sorry, but what star sign do you have to be to be unconcerned that your husband murdered his previous wife, only glad because it means he might prefer you to her?! I began to lose patience with the main character at this point. Is it believable that for all her imagining she can’t imagine that Max might be a terrible person for shooting a woman and disposing of her body?
Nevertheless I did enjoy this book, wild as the ending was.
It’s very clever how most of the first half of the book isn’t things that actually happened, but rather describes things the narrator imagines. The whole plot is very internalised, and that makes it different and I thought worked well.
Rebecca, known only to the narrator through stories people tell her, in which she is beautiful, clever and gregarious, becomes hugely intimidating and a standard the narrator feels she will never meet. She worries her husband will never love her because she will always look poor in comparison. Yet when things turn out to be not how they first seemed and she finds out her husband actually hated Rebecca and in fact murdered her, the narrator’s first reaction is to be relieved thinking that he didn’t love Rebecca after all! I’m sorry, but what star sign do you have to be to be unconcerned that your husband murdered his previous wife, only glad because it means he might prefer you to her?! I began to lose patience with the main character at this point. Is it believable that for all her imagining she can’t imagine that Max might be a terrible person for shooting a woman and disposing of her body?
Nevertheless I did enjoy this book, wild as the ending was.
12344566's review against another edition
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25