2024 Reading Challenge

2024 Reading Challenge
Jill Elizabeth has read 1 book toward her goal of 285 books.
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2023 Reading Challenge

2023 Reading Challenge
Jill Elizabeth has read 5 books toward her goal of 265 books.
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Book Review: Our Crooked Hearts by Melissa Albert

About the Book

The suburbs, right now . . .
Seventeen-year-old Ivy’s summer break kicks off with an accident, a punishment, and a mystery: a stranger whose appearance in the middle of the road, in the middle of the night, heralds a string of increasingly unsettling events. As the days pass, Ivy grapples with eerie offerings, corroded memories, and a secret she’s always known—that there’s more to her mother than meets the eye.

The city, back then . . .
Dana has always been perceptive. And the summer she turns sixteen, with the help of her best friend and an ambitious older girl, her gifts bloom into a heady fling with the supernatural. As the trio’s aspirations darken, they find themselves speeding toward a violent breaking point.

Years after it began, Ivy and Dana’s shared story will come down to a reckoning among a daughter, a mother, and the dark forces they never should’ve messed with.

My Review

This was a weird, trippy, engaging tale of mothers and daughters, of secrets and best friends, and most of all – of magic. I am not usually a fan of complex stories on audiobook, as I have a harder time fully engaging when I’m listening – but this time around, I am so glad I chose the audio version!

I really loved the dual narration and think it worked perfectly for the story. Normally, I prefer a single narrator and only minor voice modifications to indicate character or perspective switches because I find multiple voices and accents to be distracting. Here, the two voice actors were such perfect embodiments of how I imagined the characters that the duality – with all its distinctinctions in not only maturity and age of the character but also in tone and even volume of the reader – really enhanced the two perspectives.

I loved the complex world-building, both in terms of the way magic was portrayed and in terms of the interpersonal relationships between family members (both biological and chosen). It was a clever and intelligent story that wove in so many elements: the power of friendship and family, the nature of truth, the interplay between duty and obligation, the lies we tell ourselves to survive, and the justifications we give to underpin the decisions we make…

It was a brilliant and complex tale and I thoroughly enjoyed it!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for my obligation-free review copy.

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