Reviews tagging 'Toxic friendship'

One Perfect Couple: Der New-York-Times-Bestseller | »Köstlich düster und absolut fesselnd.« LUCY FOLEY by Ruth Ware

11 reviews

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

Rather repetitive and predictable, but I also kind of expected that somehow.
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gwenswoons's review against another edition

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dark slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

0.25

God this was so unrelentingly terrible. Terrible characters, terrible plot, terrible everything. And just terrible writing, somehow both repetitive and inconsistent, ugly and banal on a sentence level. Predictable, badly written, boring, meaningless. I honestly cannot believe that people can read this and tolerate it and that it got past editors in this state.

I listened to it on 2x speed while driving and doing errands and chores and I STILL wish I could get those 7 hours and 4 and a half minutes back. You could not pay me to read another book by Ruth Ware.
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kiwichill's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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oxfordcommas91's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

This book was an absolute disaster. Maybe I've just been lucky and read some great thrillers, but honestly I don't think this book should be able to be classified as a thriller. The premise was intriguing enough: 5 couples get dropped off on a dreamy tropical island to compete against each other in a reality TV show, but a massive storm sweeps through the island and turns the competition into a fight for survival. Who wouldn't be interested? I was hoping for mystery and psychological suspense (as promised in the book's description) but instead got a highly predictable rip-off of Lord of the Flies with a cast of instagram influencers. (The fact that LOTF, a classic novel, even gets referenced during the climax of the manufactured "tension" really set me off...).
There's so much wrong with this book that it's difficult to know where to start. The characters were all shallow caricature's of what the author assumes that Gen Z/millennial influencers are. She posits our "main character," Lyla, as the "brains" of the book since she's a postdoc scientific researcher, but Lyla ends up being just as superficial and helpless as the rest of the women. Though the book picked up pace towards the middle/end (and mercifully put us out of the misery of the first 30% which was slow as molasses), at no point was I gripped or desperate to know what happened next. I was waiting for the twist that literally never came. If the reveal that happens around 90% of the way in is Ruth Ware's idea of a "twist," I am so glad that I have never picked up her other novels. By the end I literally felt like I had wasted all the hours I put into reading this. 
The only reason it gets 2 stars instead of 1 is that there was some semi-intriguing moments of tension throughout, and I was invested in a few characters and their survival by the end. The writing wasn't terrible, I just wish that the plot was more fleshed out in a way that was at least semi-believable. 
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shesflippinpages's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark hopeful inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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celticthistle's review against another edition

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dark lighthearted reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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lovelymisanthrope's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

As a long time fan of Ruth Ware I was excited to pick up her latest release.
“One Perfect Couple” follows Lyla and her boyfriend Nico as they venture to a remote island, Ever After Island, to participate in a new game show a lot like “Love Island”. Along with four other couples, Lyla and Nico think they are about to enjoy a few weeks in paradise, and the chance to win a massive prize. Unfortunately, nature has other plans, and the island is hit with a massive storm. Lyla was not initially interested in partaking in this endeavor, but she wanted to support Nico. Now, she has to fight for her life, because there might just be a killer on the island. 
The premise of this book did not initially catch my eye, and I 100% picked it up because I am a fan of  Ruth Ware. I am not a fan of dating reality shows, so I was apprehensive going into this story. I also am not super interested in reading stories that follow a group of characters in a high stakes competition. Nonetheless, I had a fun, okay time reading this story. The game show element is definitely a big part of the story, but there is a lot more going on behind the scenes that I was able to put more of my focus on.
This very much felt like a new age “Lord of the Flies”. A storm comes in and completely decimates the island, and the surviving characters have to work together to try and figure out a way off of the island. They have no means of transportation, and they have no way of communicating with the rest of the world. They also have to ration the remaining food and water. This aspect of the story was interesting to me because in high stress situations, people’s true colors start to come out. I really enjoyed watching the group dynamics shift and see just how far certain characters would go to survive. 
Lyla was an interesting point of view to read from because she was not even interested in participating in this show. She is a scientist, but her career has seemed to stagnate. She does love Nico, so when he asks her to come, do this show with him to help him, and his acting career, she agrees. This initial resistance really becomes evident, while she is interacting with the other characters, because she has every intention of trying to leave and does not want to win. 
Unfortunately, the overall story fell a little flat for me. The characters and their behavior were highly predictable, because they acted exactly as you would expect people to behave in this scenario. Although I did not see the overall mystery of who the true puppet master was, and what their sinister intentions were, I did not think it was a super unique plot line. Additionally, there is a twist, because the remaining characters take it upon themselves to shape the narrative in a different way, so this drastically changes, the impact of the big twist of the story. I really did not like that the author added this element. I felt like the characters had been through enough, and their rationale for making this decision that changed the course of the story, felt very unnecessary. The entire conversation between the characters at this point in the story made the novel feel very amateur. 
I will definitely continue to keep Ruth Ware on my TBR, and I do recommend this story to someone who enjoys competition based thrillers.
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havenraven23's review against another edition

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dark emotional sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

Least fave book from this author I've read so far. Idk it started off good, but it was too long for the story she told. It dragged too much at times since there wasn't a real mystery to solve, & everything was way too obvious. 
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uranaishi's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

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kimveach's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This was precisely what I wanted to read after reading a few very slow-paced books.  I loved the mix of reality show participants and being stranded on a desert island.  Warning:  have a glass of water nearby while reading;  you'll feel dehydrated!
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