What Big Teeth

Creepy teeth-related stories always draw me in because I am one for the macabre, but this one just did not do it sadly. Maybe it was the writing style or maybe it was the characters that I just really couldn't get behind. I can see people liking this one - it's weird, yeah, but who doesn't like an odd book from time to time? For me, what really lacked was likable characters and a writing style that flowed. Sadly, this one just did not have that.

I knew this had mixed reviews going in so I wasn't really surprised when I found that I was on the “not liking it side”. What I didn't know was how much on that side I was. I only read until about 30% when I finally couldn't take it anymore and called it quits. I also ranted to a friend about it – which is always fun to do. I understood absolutely nothing of this book. There was no character motivation for anyone, no one had any personality. I couldn't see anyone improving at all which is also why I chose not to carry on. I can't stand reading a book if there's no character development of any type.

There's also nothing in this book that made sense. Eleanor hasn't seen or heard from/spoken to her family in eight years but she's just gonna magically go back home because she had an incident at the school. Then she complains about how her family's treating her – like yeah that'll happen when you never see each other but also then she keeps trying to play by their rules, tries to placate them. Why do all of that when they make it perfectly clear that they don't like you?

Absolutely NO ONE in the book is interesting or redeemable and I would rather jump off a cliff than be in the same room as ANY of them. Eleanor's mom was the only remotely interesting character and all we know is that she's in a bathtub. I don't think we're even told what type of supernatural creature she is – which is a shame because then I would be a bit more interested.

I found it very funny (in a bad way that made me not like her – Eleanor – even further) is that Eleanor's grandmother dies, right? And in a really terrible written way too. And she tells her not to invite anyone who isn't family to the house. So, of course... what Eleanor does next is that she invites basically the entire town to the funeral. At the house that the grandmother doesn't want any non-family members to be there. Admittedly, I didn't read far enough to get to the actual funeral, but I knew it from others' reviews.

I found it hilarious that Luma, her older sister (about 20 or so reviews have said), was her older sister because I first thought she was about 12/13 – because she acted like that age. I have no idea if she ever went to school with other kids and thus got that type of interaction. I'm not so bothered by characters acting younger or older than they really are but there's a difference between that and me thinking that a 20 year old was 13.

I think the absolute WORST character is Arthur. He's said to be middle-aged, bald, and I don't even know if he's actually conventionally attractive (not that that's all important) but literally EVERYONE in the family – from the grandparents to the TEENAGERS – Eleanor whom is said to be 16?? – is utterly infatuated with him. There's a huge spoiler about him that I won't say here but uhh he is not what he appears – either at face value or chronologically and that's all I'll say. Every time I had to see him on the page I wanted to physically recoil because he was the absolute worst.

I mentioned Luma not acting like her age and Rhys also never acted like his age? He's in college so I'm guessing about 20. I could not for the life of me imagine he's that age. Everyone acted like he was this amazing person and super super cool guy and you have me in the corner there's me in the corner side-eyeing this entire family because why on earth would you want to give a lot of responsibilities to THIS guy – it made entirely no sense whatsoever.

The bit of the plot I experienced was... well, quite an experience! I don't think even if I liked the characters I could stomach the plot, or vice versa. Honestly I'm amazed that I managed to get to 30% and kept wanting to read other books in January. And that, my friends, is why it's totally okay to marks books you aren't enjoying as “will/did not finish”.

2.5☆

It got good towards 70% into the book. I am still so very unsure if I really liked this book or if it just made me curious?

Literally everything would've not happened if the mc would've just listened and I think I'm mostly just annoyed with that?

one of the most nonsensical, plotless, confusing, pointless books ive ever read. no idea what i was supposed to gain or feel or even what half of the plot points even meant. was absolutely dragging myself through the last 100 pages. half a star for some decent writing.

dios se sintió como si un camión me paso por encima

If you're looking for a creepy book about a big house in Maine with a very weird family this is for you! The audiobook narration is also great if that's your thing!

DNF

While things start off interesting, with atmosphere and a flair for the cinematic, there seems to be something irreparably off about this book. The prose doesn't keep pace with itself - meaning that it's weirdly easy to miss important information and actions because nothing is given particular emphasis. There are all these possible mysteries being introduced at once, but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be curious about or what I'm supposed to care about. It all just blurs together.

But most importantly, Eleanor is just an absolutely bizarre main character. There is nothing grounded about her, nothing relatable, nothing that actually sounds like a real human being. There is a fine line between making stylistic choices for the sake of creating a particular vision, and just sounding contrived. This is well over that line.

WOW that was Complex!!! This was REALLY good, and it makes me want to slam my head into a wall (but like in a Good way)!!!!!! This is Definitely a Gothic Horror book, and one with FANTASTIC characters at that!!!

If you go in with low expectations it's an ok book. It's not good. It's bad until it's good like Riverdale on Netflix. The monsters were interesting though I guess.

It really hurts me to write a negative review, I recognize that a lot of effort went into writing, publishing, and promoting it. I read this for Stacks of Strange, and had it not been for that I would have DNF'd it early on.
I want to say that my main problem was the writing style, but truthfully I read pretty widely, so I have encountered many types of writing styles. What was going on here, and it drove me nuts, was the withholding of information from the reader.
At first I thought I maybe stumbled across a novel in the vein of The Munsters.
< img src=”https://media0.giphy.com/media/l2SpQlO0t53NoV2Wk/giphy.gif” / >
Was Eleanor the Marilyn? Sadly, there is no humor to be found here at all.
And as much as I caught on that Eleanor was trying very hard to be a character in a Shirley Jackson world that was never going to happen because she couldn't make up her mind who she was. She alternated between “no one loves me” to “I'm special and no one sees it” so often I just started rolling my eyes.
What really ruined this story for me was the character of Arthur. I just want to puke thinking about how useless this whole character is, despite the fact that EVERYONE is physically attracted to him. I couldn't help but think of Gary Oldman in Dracula. Only Dracula actually has a personality.
Le sigh.
I muddled through it, so do the characters.
When we finally get a worthy BIG BAD, I didn't care anymore. But wait, we must go back in time while a ghost fills us in on the backstory we should have had 100 pages ago!
The morale of the story here is that characters need to talk to each other. If everyone had just spoken to Eleanor and explained things, things would not have gone off the rails.
This is one of the most unloving families I've read since the Dollangers.
I still don't understand the mom in the tub. Did she have a name?
And Margaret, who was HAND's DOWN the most interesting character, does not get explored at all. Oh, had the book been from her point of view....