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deniz

Closet Geeks and Slow Mo

Review: The Revenge Playbook

The Revenge Playbook - Rachael  Allen

3.5 Stars

So I expect a cute & fluffy about love and friendship with some fun action thrown in... I mean look at the cover! The cover slut in me, was so sure this was going to be a cute read, then read the blurb.. Says cute & fluffy alright, doesn't it?
But while there is a bit of romance, there are cute moments - this ain't really fluffy. Which is not a bad thing by all means. I just expected different.
Instead I got a intricate story about date rape, hazing, injustice and hierarchy in High School and the forming of new friendships

Let me just be upfront: My biggest issue with this one is the format. Though I kinda like it retrospectively. While reading it, especially the first half, I struggled. Basically i like the idea of how the novel was structured but I don't like the execution.
There are four POVs and a whole lot of cast to this one. Now I have the most atrocious name memory- so this was a nightmare for me, since I kept having to go back and check who was who. Then the different POV all sound the same- which meant if I put the book down I half the time had to go back to check who's POV I was reading. Which made this a really slow read for me. Also since I got the ARC, I kinda had to leave back page by page on my kindle- totally annoying. About 30% in I got clever and started book marking each date and time and POV...
The story is also told on different timelines- so there is jumping back and forth happening. Again I found it rather confusing at the beginning.
Retrospectively this was done really cleverly. And when the timeline collided I thought it was super brilliant.
This is however rather well written otherwise, I like Allen's writing style. (except for the issues above) And I was wondering if I would have as much issues with it, if I had a hardcopy instead of the ebook. The POV problems stands I guess, and , my name memory, I am afraid to say, is always going to be hopeless.


The character building was done well. In fact in my opinion it's the best part of the book. There is a huge cast and at the end of the book I feel like know half the school. I really like the girls and I could related to them. It was interesting to see their journey, see how they changed and how they set out to do something on a bit of a whim, but not only followed through, but kinda uncovered much deeper issues. I like the different relationships the girls have with the cast.

Would you have asked me while I was somewhere before the 50% mark how much I would rate it- It would have been somewhere between 2 and 3 Stars. In fact, if I wouldn't have like the writing style while I was at around 20% I would have DNFed. But I am so glad I didn't. Because for the second half I would rate it 4 Stars.
Allen touch me with the story and the girls and somehow everything came together. I love that the end is actually very realistic. On the face of things no huge victories but those small ones? EPIC!

A beautiful book that takes some work getting through.

On another note: I would love this as a movie- someone make this into a movie please!