hello everyone! today i am going to be talking about truly devious by Maureen Johnson. i gave this book 4/5 stars. honestly, i have already dnfed this book once, but i found the audio book, so i wanted to give it ago, and honestly this was just so good and this is now one of my favorite series in a crazy turn of events.
trigger warning- panic attacks, death, kidnapping, child death, violence, murder, blood, mental illness.
overall, i really liked this school setting. i honestly, really liked how we got to see this high school, or whatever it technically is. but, that it was about what the kids what to learn. and i honestly just found that to be kind of cool, since i feel like most boarding schools deal with like art and whatever they are into. and i don’t know, i just found that one to be kind of cool and i just really liked it.
and i feel like the atmosphere just added so much to this story. cause i feel like if it was just a regular high school or even a happier and more lively boarding school it wouldn’t really work. and cause it’s so dark i feel like it was just so good and i really liked it. and it was kind of a modern Sherlock Holmes, to a degree, with i really liked.
and i really liked the whole character driven story. since, i feel like there are some YA thriller mysteries that are more plot driven, so with this one being more character driven it was just pretty cool. and it was honestly so good and i just completely loved how this worked and the writing style was just so cool.
i also thought it was kind of cool that we get to see the past and also the present. since, they are mixed together, with Stevie trying to figure out what actually happened. so, it was just cool to see what was going on now, with figuring out who did it and Stevie’s day to day life, but also what happened to the school after everything.
Stevie was also such a cool character. since i mean we got to see how she acts with both mysteries and just a really deep look into her mind. and i think she was such a well rounded character, which was so cool. like Stevie was such a true crime nerd, which is something that was just so cool and i really liked.
this is more in the next book, but it’s still in here a little bit, but i honestly loved the riddles. like, they were just so cool and kind of added a depth to this book, since Stevie had to figure everything out in order to figure out the case and what actually happened. and no hate to other books, but i feel like this just added so much to the story, which some books are kind of missing, so i really liked this depth.
but, i did find the romance to be kind of stupid. like, she came to this school to figure out this mystery and to go to school and everything. but, then it was just like a switch that made her kind of forget about this mystery for this romance. which, i mean i just thought it was so stupid and it really took away from the story.
and i would have completely liked the romance so much more if it was more of a subplot, and not the main thing in this book. and like i liked the two characters, but not really together since it just was kind of boring and not good, especially as the main plot.
but, also Stevie was supposed to be besties and like Janelle was the sole reason she went to this school, but then she just like disappeared. like, she was still in this book, which honestly sucked and didn’t make much sense. cause, if you go to this school for someone, you would probably be stuck at the hip with them, so that honestly sucked.
this might have just been me, or i thought they were talking about the different person. but, there was this character, i think their name was Vi or Vivi, something along those lines. but, they made it super clear that their pronouns are they/them, but then when people where talking about them, they would use she/her when they weren’t around. which, was just so annoying, if i’m remembering this right.
but, i also feel like a ton of plot points and different things just brought up. which, was pretty cool, and had so much potential, but then it just didn’t work out. like, it was brought up so much, and it felt like every time something was brought up, but then it kind of just fell to the side, since new things would just be brought up. and this just made me feel like of like things were just falling to the side.
and i mean the ending of the book also felt like so rushed. like Johnson could only hit so many pages she couldn’t go over so she just needed to wrap everything up so quickly. which, was just so shitty. and this is probably just me, but it was just so rushed and kind of took me away from the story.
and then there was so many characters in this school it just got to be so hard to understand and remember who was who. since, there was just so many of them, it was so hard to remember who was who. and i mean most of them just didn’t have a personality, so that is also probably why i couldn’t really remember who everyone was.
anyway, that is all for today! i hope you liked this blog post, since it was kind of all over the place. but, i mean this series is honestly so good, and i really loved this book. and i’m so excited to read the rest of this series for when the new book comes out later this year.
r.bookish 