Posted on by Zuky the BookBum

DNF Review: One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus

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Synopsis:

Pay close attention and you might solve this.

On Monday afternoon, five students at Bayview High walk into detention.

Bronwyn, the brain, is Yale-bound and never breaks a rule.

Addy, the beauty, is the picture-perfect homecoming princess.

Nate, the criminal, is already on probation for dealing.

Cooper, the athlete, is the all-star baseball pitcher.

And Simon, the outcast, is the creator of Bayview High’s notorious gossip app.

Only, Simon never makes it out of that classroom. Before the end of detention Simon’s dead. And according to investigators, his death wasn’t an accident. On Monday, he died. But on Tuesday, he’d planned to post juicy reveals about all four of his high-profile classmates, which makes all four of them suspects in his murder. Or are they the perfect patsies for a killer who’s still on the loose?

Everyone has secrets, right? What really matters is how far you would go to protect them.

Review:

DNF @ 30%

OK, so I almost hate myself for putting this one down, but apparently I just can’t deal with books that are even slightly YA. There is something about the writing and the characters that I really can’t get on with.

Now, don’t get me wrong, this is clearly well written and the characters, from what I read, are well developed but I just couldn’t get past the teen-ness of this. I like books that are gritty and use words that I sometimes have to stop and Google, that’s just my preference… so that’s why I couldn’t get on with this. Completely down to the fact that it’s just not my style of book.

When I got to 23% a small thought planted itself in my head and because I wasn’t thoroughly enjoying reading it, I decided to skip to the end to see if my thoughts were correct, and I was halfway there. That’s not the say this book doesn’t have a good twist, because from reading lots of reviews, it does come as quite a shock to most people.

Never again am I going to request and download a book that’s a mystery & thriller but also teen & YA. At least I’ve learnt a lesson.

Thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Random House UK Children’s for giving me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review… I promise I won’t request from you again so you don’t waste an ARC on me!

27 Replies to “DNF Review: One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus”

      1. I totally get where you are coming from. I always think that the next one I try I will feel differently but it just doesn’t happen. It isn’t the book’s fault at all, I just can’t warm to YA.

        Liked by 1 person

  2. My confession – «I love YA» 😀 But I still had so many problems with this book. It was a very light read (maybe even too light?). I ended up giving it only 2 starts and hope that other people (probably younger audience) will enjoy it more than I did.

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  7. I don’t like YA either but I’m still sort of tempted to try this out at some point since I loved The Breakfast Club so much in high school…. but I’ll probably hate it, haha. Great review, Zuky!

    Liked by 1 person

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  9. Oh, how interesting to see a review of it from the other end… most reviews I’ve read have only been praise and as I, too, love The Breakfast Club I have put this on my shelf… I worry about the teenness of it all, but as you said, the promise of character development is still keeping me hooked… I’m rather intrigued now how it’ll go fo me! Great DNF review!

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Thanks Liz. Yes, this one wasn’t for me purely because of the genre it fell into. I didn’t think there was anything fundamentally wrong with this book, or at least the bits I read, I just couldn’t get into it because of the writing etc. I hope you enjoy it as so many others have! 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

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  11. Pingback: Sunday Summary | 28th – 4th June – BookBum

  12. You know I’m starting to get like this myself – outgrowing YA. I’ve been reading a lot more this past year (getting back into the swing of recreational reading after years of required college readings), but the novels I’ve read have almost all been hyped up YA books and I haven’t enjoyed a good amount of them as much as I thought I would.

    But I’ve also noticed a trend of a fondness for good mystery and thriller books so I was thinking this was book would be the perfect ~transition~ for myself haha

    Too bad you didn’t enjoy this one, but I don’t blame you. YA is not everyone’s cup of tea!

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Yes, I think if you’re moving on from YA to other genres, this might be a good book for you. There actually looks like there are quite a few good thriller YA books coming out / already out, but I couldn’t read them myself.

      I hope you enjoy this one if you end up reading it!

      Liked by 1 person

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