Daphne

Didn't like the writing style, too slow, confusing

DNF. maybe men should stop trying to write young female characters....

literally thought this was about middle schoolers- not 18 year olds. infantile descriptions of young adults. hated the hour i spent on it.

I love this man's writing, it really does invoke a sense of creepiness and suspense that is hard to shake, and keeps you coming back wanting to know how it ends! It was also a wonderfully depicted exploration of anxiety and the transition from teen to young adult.

*2.5 stars. There were passages here that had Malerman qualities that love, but he can be very hit or miss for me. This one - was a miss with too much repetition and too much teen-speak.

4.75 // “If you can think something terrible into being, why not something great?”

my first Josh Malerman book—this book spooked the fuck out of me & I loved every minute of it, our mc Kit struggles with severe anxiety & I related to her so much because of that—this book is about anxiety & the manifestation of thoughts & it's brilliant

this book did make me extremely anxious though I should've seen that comin, anyway all i have to say now is just don't think about daphne!

“Make sure they understand the things we're told not to talk about are the things that get real bad. Those subjects get sick. And they get confused. And nobody can make sense of them because they were never allowed to talk them out.”

I enjoyed Daphne up until the ending. I feel like the ending was rushed and it knocked a few stars off for me. I also would have liked more backstory on Daphne and the crimes she committed. Other than that, The story was fun, creepy and original. I also like the whole spin on “Bloody Mary” and chain letters etc.

As a fan of basketball it was cool to see it take center stage throughout the novel. I'm still a little bothered by the abrupt ending but I would recommend this his book to a friend especially if that person is a fan of the cliche happy ending.

Pretty good riff on Bloody Mary/it follows type mythology, ending kinda fell apart for me

4.5 Stars- loved this one. Very fast paced. Definitely sent MY anxiety levels racing.

1.5
Such a cool concept but such a bad execution. I am surprised that I even finished the book coz it was SOO boringg. Every single part was BORING. I started this as a buddy read in the beginning of September and just finished it. And reading other reviews I feel like I read a book which was completely different to what the others read:(
Also the writing style was so confusing and hard to understand and I still dont know what happened in the end. Gonna have to ask someone to explain the entire plot of the book to me

This author has been an auto buy for me since reading Bird Box (although I don't always read them immediately). I didn't get it on release day, but I'm into the timely release. 

I strangely read this before/at the same time as/during/ two other reads (Wild Things by Ian Thomas/ Goosebumps: Hall of Horrors: Claws by R. L. Stine) that also starred young kids/teenage girls. It's interesting to see how all of the author's portrayed them and the differences. Malerman's features high school characters from the girl's basketball team, and it was nice to see him have them act/speak age appropriate. One thing that surprised me though was that it's meant to be current, but there wasn't anything indicting the generation in any way in terms of slang. 

This book very heavily leans into basketball. It bleeds into the plot, the settings, the characters, everything. As someone that doesn't really care for it, it made it kind of hard to get into the story for me. While I understand that reading is a way to learn and experience perspectives we do not live ourselves, it just doesn't work for me in that way. IE. I've never been a teenage girl living through the trauma of a horror novel, therefore that's a perspective I can get behind. However, entire pages about free throws is not the same in my opinion, although I've never been a basketball player either. 

After reading the afterward where the author speaks to his love of basketball I can accept it though. He also speaks of his experience with anxiety, as this novel goes pretty heavily into bad anxiety, anxiety attacks, and panic attacks. I myself suffer from some pretty bad anxiety, and although what the author is describing does not match my personal experience, knowing it entails a bit of his personal experience makes it more enjoyable. 

One writing technique that the author uses that I thoroughly enjoyed was doing away with normal chapters. The novel does feature typical breaking points, but there is not a single conventional chapter in its entirety. At first I think it took me a while to get into in terms to pacing, as well as making a few points confusing, but it lead to one hell of an explosive ending. 

Another good entry from the author.