The Obsession

Nora Roberts certainly has a style. I knew who the killer was before it was even introduced that there WAS another killer. This book is 100% predictable especially if you've read even one of her other books. SNOOZE. Last Roberts book I'm reading for sure.

DNF at 30%

I wanted to see what all the hype about Nora Roberts was, and this was the first title my library had readily available. Since borrowing this book, I've read several reviews which say this isn't representative of her best work, so I may try a different one at some point. Were it not for those warnings, however, this book would have totally put me off of her writing. It's just lifeless and boring. A vast majority of my reading time became skimming time because I couldn't maintain focus otherwise - and I still didn't care enough to finish and quit just before a third of the book.

The writing style never grabbed me. It felt more like the page count came from lack of concise writing and a lapse in editing than from truly having a long story to tell. Things which should have been frantic - escaping a rape dungeon, having a panic attack, trying to save a dying relative - are detached and slow. Things which have no reason to take up so much space in a supposed “romantic thriller” - descriptions of interior design, especially - take up so many pages that it feels more like the novelization of an IKEA catalogue sometimes. Characters we're supposed to have conflicting emotions about, such as Naomi's mother, feel more like poorly written and inconsistent caricatures than complex individuals. And, most annoyingly, there are so many moments where things just plain don't make sense.

Some of the Illogical Nonsense:

- While in a friend's home, a teenager witnesses an overdose which leads to suicide. The police immediately interrogate him about why he isn't at school then escort him to school. He just saw a suicide. He's given no immediate counseling or stability assessment. His parents aren't called. Just, bye, get your ass in school young man. Wtf?!

- Someone is able to discern that Noami is an excellent photographer... based on a picture that has her in it and was taken with the auto timer.

- Namoi's mother is supposedly so perfectly gaslighted and emotionally abused that she is willing to betray her own children in favour of a disgusting monster. Yet she also magically has the wherewithal to know she's gaslighted. Also she's blindly bigoted because her piece of shit husband was, yet she was never bigoted before and has the presence of mind to know this and immediately apologize. She is blindly obedient to her husband, yet the blind obedience disappears and she just accepts Namoi not wanting to visit like he demands. It's inconsistent and unrealistic. If the attempt is to show conflict or actual gaslighting, it's pretty damn important to not show the character being aware of the mental conditioning and to actually stick to the repercussions of supposed blind devotion instead of easing off when convenient. This begins as early as the moment she learns of the crime. Somehow, this woman is brainwashed enough to accuse her daughter of lying yet self-aware enough to say she only doesn't want to admit it isn't made up because then it will be real. That's not how those thought processes actually work.

- The sentence: She could slip into the storeroom from there for the belated alone.

- Naomi is such a baby that she tries to wreck someone's future to blackmail him when he finds out her true identity. But you'd think if it mattered that much, she'd have changed her first name as well. Also, if she's half the naive, little saint we're supposed to think she is, she'd have never come up with such a despicable plan. Oh, and then she gives an interview anyway to someone else. Because she's a hypocritical jackass.

Overall, I skimmed huge chunks of home renovations and was often bored by the narrative style. I also wonder how much the rights to have Naomi quote Shake It Off cost, since I doubt Taylor Swift's manager would let it go unchallenged. But I just did not connect at all and hated the writing so much I gave up.

I already returned the library book without even skipping ahead to see how it ends. I don't care. None of these characters are compelling enough to make me waste my life reading about them.

Another Nora Roberts reread. I enjoy her character development so much. You can see it really well in the J D Robb books, since those follow the same characters, but even in a standalone novel the characters are great. The side characters have their own lives and motivations, and while we might not see all of that in the book we still have the sense that it's there. These people exist outside of the main character.