don't read, terrible

filled star star unfilled star unfilled star unfilled star unfilled
readatnight00 Avatar

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i won this book as part of BF raffle and it got lost in the mail and I AM SO GLAD. i got myself an audio copy instead, which i am not glad about, and wow, this was terrible.

This was a really uncomfortable read to get through and I"m sure the author and publishers know why at this point

I think it had potential on the LGBTQ side of things but it was also done in a way that left me rather confused. Were the characters being misgendered the whole time and never corrected it (for some reason) or was this a push on how we use gender and pronouns? I'd like to give the author the benefit of the doubt on this one since they are NB but some of it also made me feel iffy. As for the story and content, I was disappointed to see that while this was a decently sized book, not much actually happened and the ending was very lacking. It ends in a way that would suggest a sequel but I very much doubt many people would pick up another book by this author (and if they do, the ratings are not looking great)

As for the reason I will be rating this low and not recommending it, this book was full of racism that honestly, could have been removed entirely. Why make the hero a black man if all you are going to do is throw the police at him (and show us a very detailed and uncomfortable torture/police brutality scene), belittle him, make him a caricature, and then demonize him when he shows his anger for the mistreatment he has been faced with? And he's not the only black character that got this type of treatment, even though he was the main one we followed. And, of course, the perpetrators (aka. the other MCs, there are 4 of them but I'm thinking of Jack specifically) get away with it. No, in fact, Jack is put on such a pedestal that I was just left slack-jawed. I understand the appeal of a morally grey type of character but Jack was just, no.

I wish I'd read the reviews for this before buying, ugh