H
4.5⭐ (RE-READ)
This was a reread, and just like the first time back in January it was amazing.
The opening chapters of this book are easily my favorite in the entire series. When Lana finally comes face to face with the Boogeyman ohhhh my god, it was epic. The way she stared him down, mocked him, and just didn't flinch? Legendary. Her sarcasm is from another planet, I swear.
Watching her switch into a shocked and helpless victim mode after killing him was absolutely ICONIC. And then when Hadley came out of the closet and Lana's real shock hit? I laughed so hard.
Throughout the rest of the book, their relationship really starts to form, and it's so nice to see, especially knowing they're both victims, each carrying their own trauma. At the same time, we see Hadley struggling internally, torn between what's logical and what feels right.
Now that the team is in Lana's hometown, they're getting closer to the truth with every chapter. And it will chock them, break them as it did to me.
Favorite Quotes:
“Boogeyman,” she says, looking up at him. “Took you long enough.”
“I'm the girl who takes on the darkest of men. Men who've done things dark and twisted to the weak. Men who preyed on the innocent. Men who thought they killed me when I was weak. Just like the women you've killed.”
“I'm so much worse and better than you. I'm the thing the monsters in the dark fear. And now I'm even the Boogeyman's nightmare.”
She winks—fucking winks—at him. She's enjoying every second of this.
And I watch with her as the Boogeyman dies by his own knife. At the hands of a woman.
The hands of a victim.
In a way, it's poetic justice.
It'll take me forever to clean all that up.
I'd call him inconsiderate, but since I'm the one that sort of stabbed him, then I guess it's my own fault. I should have let him run into the knife on the tile floor instead of the carpet.
Oh well. I can finally get that hardwood I've been considering.
I practice my blank stare. I keep holding the knife, giving it a white-knuckle grip, certain a girl in shock would do just the same.
Yep.
Got this down.
Jeez. I'm glad I didn't need to be saved. An entry that loud would have gotten me killed immediately.
All the color drains from my face as Hadley struggles on the ground.
I take it back. I remember now what it's like to be afraid, because the fear is etching up my spine.
I also don't have to fake being frozen in shock either.
Immediately I go and lock the door, and then I listen through the walls like a total creeper. All I need is a glass stuck to my ear.
Nope. I don't look guilty at all.
“If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?”
—William Shakespeare
“Sheesh! We're in the middle of Fucking Madhouse Hollow, on the edge of the woods, and you give a girl a heart attack?! Not cool, Bennett. Not fucking cool,” says the redheaded girl who knowingly drove the killer into town.
Infinite stars ⭐
This book absolutely broke me.
It tells the painful story of what really happened to Lana when she was just seventeen, what was done to her brother, and what happened to her father. These events were mentioned before in books 1 to 3, but never in this much detail. Yes, the scenes are explicit. While reading and listening to the audiobook, I often had to pause, especially during certain moments like the mirror scene. It was just too much, it was horrific beyond words. The feelings I experienced while reading were intense and overwhelming.
The author has been building Lana's backstory from the beginning, piece by piece, and in this book, it all comes together. If you weren't already convinced she's the victim, you will be now. Even though she's killing, even though she's taking revenge, you understand her. You feel for her. And you know, without a doubt, that if she hadn't taken matters into her own hands, there would have been no justice. Not for her. Not for her brother. Not for her father.
This book also shows how broken the justice system can be. A single family was destroyed by the actions and lies of others, especially the one who framed her father. You reach a point where you realize no one was going to help her. If she didn't fight back, no one would have ever paid for what happened. And even the FBI, without knowing who she really is, starts to feel that she's not just some cold-blooded killer. She's someone who was left with no other option.
What broke my heart also was when Logan thought Lana was just a proxy killer, that she was being used and manipulated by Jake. He didn't realize that she was Victoria.
Though this is a fictional story and Lana may not be a real person, the horrors she and her family faced could happen to anyone. Unfortunately, we live in a cruel world, and what happened to Lana might be nothing compared to real experiences of others. This story reminded me painfully that such things are not just fiction, they are reality for many.
Am still wondering how i finished this book. Seriously i hated Both of the characters.
The MMC spent 90 percent of the book sleeping with girls that looked like his ex fiancée and only when he nearly fcked his actual fiancée thinking she's s.o else who of course looked like his ex that he knew how much he fcked up and poooof he wanted his actual fiancée, not his ex wooooow just like that.
And plz don't let me start speaking about the FMC, girrrl have some dignity
The only good thing in this book is the friendship between anna and sofia
5⭐
looking from the outside, u'll just see a couple coming back to look for their lost child, for their stolen house, but it is more than that
3⭐
It's a good read. The story of the four boys, their loyalty to each other, it's wonderful. Lyra and Briar, their friendship is amazing.
