Title: He Said/She Said by Erin Kelly
Pages: 416
Published by: Hodder & Stoughton
Publication date: 20th April 2017
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Format: Hardback
Amazon UK – Waterstones
Synopsis:
In the hushed aftermath of a total eclipse, Laura witnesses a brutal attack.
She and her boyfriend Kit call the police, and in that moment, it is not only the victim’s life that is changed forever.
Fifteen years on, Laura and Kit live in fear.
And while Laura knows she was right to speak out, the events that follow have taught her that you can never see the whole picture: something – and someone – is always in the dark…
My review:
Before I get into this review, I just want to give myself a pat on the back for finally reading this book! I bought this May last year so at least I didn’t have it sitting on my shelf for a year before I finally picked it up.
Now into the review! I sadly did not like this book. I did not like it at all. Maybe it’s because I had really high expectations for it and it didn’t even stand a chance at meeting them. But I had seen so many five star reviews for this so I was expecting for myself to give it five stars (it didn’t even come close to that). The start of the book was so boring and slow. I was actually contemplating not finishing it before I’d even hit 100 pages, I was that bored. Then when it got exciting the author even managed to make that boring. Everything about this book was just so underwhelming and not worth the bother.
The start of the book is so confusing, I didn’t have a clue what any of the characters were talking about. Laura continually says things like what Beth put us through and how it wrecked their lives and I was just sat there like who is Beth????? What did she do?? TELL ME!! It just got to the point where I was so fed up of not knowing what had happened and I felt like I was being kept in the dark for no reason. I hate when books just start and don’t tell you anything. If this was some sort of ploy to grab your attention and make you want to carry on reading, it didn’t work on me.
The story flips between the past (1999-2000) when the rape took place and the present (2015). Laura’s chapters are in past and present tense while Kit spends the majority of his chapters in present tense. Laura witnesses the rape about 60 pages in and then the trial starts on page 74. It didn’t finish until page 142. The whole thing was a bloody mess and did not interest me at all. Laura spent the whole time belittling Kit and acting all self righteous for no reason at all. She was just way too involved in this and I get she wants the rapist to be put in prison but the way she acts is so infuriating. She lets her emotions cloud her judgement way too much. When she is called as a witness and is being questioned about what she saw/heard she gets so wound up that she ends up lying. I’m not going to say what she lies about or what she says exactly because I would consider that a spoiler. It is quite a big part of Laura’s story. I just wanted to shake her for being so bloody stupid. She talks with the victim before, throughout and after the trial so straight away you can see she lied because she had made contact with the victim. Which she was explicitly told not to do. But she did it anyway. Then she lied to Kit about it as well but then gets mad when he lies to her. She annoys me.
Kit was the only character I kind of liked at the start but then his character was completely and utterly ruined. He was a really decent guy at the start but then at the end of the book he completely changes and becomes unrecognisable. There’s a big reveal at the end with his character and I was not expecting it. I didn’t like it because it just felt absolutely ridiculous to me. The whole plot of this book was ridiculous. I couldn’t take anything that happened seriously.
You can probably tell that I did not like a single character in this book, which probably tells me I shouldn’t have even bothered finishing it but I did. Every character in this book is a hypocrite, Laura especially. Laura is possibly the most infuriating character I have ever come across. I hated her so much. Right at the start of the book she lies in court about the rape and then she keeps this lie to herself. She then goes on to berate everyone else for lying and actually has the audacity to get angry at others for lying. She has literally been lying for fifteen years to her boyfriend and felt guilty about it. But none of that even matters apparently when she finds out he has been lying to her. How is she even surprised? They’ve had such a rubbish life, she must have known if she was keeping a secret then he would be too.
What annoyed me is that the rapist is at the start of the book then he disappears so you think that part is over. But then right at the end he makes a sudden appearance and I was just rolling my eyes so hard. Fifteen bloody years later he’s still angry about what happened. I just didn’t feel the need for him to come back, it all just felt so irrelevant. Honestly I was so done with this book. I didn’t like how it ended. It made me hate Laura even more, if that’s possible.
So this book was so dragged out and all over the place. Kit is an eclipse chaser, he likes to travel all over the world to watch an eclipse happening. The rape Laura witnesses take place at one of the eclipses. The story is split into five parts based on each part of an eclipse. I think the plot of the book is supposed to escalate as each part of the eclipse happens before it comes to an end. I think this could have been good but to me focusing the story on the different parts of an eclipse, just made the plot of the book seem like it was all over the place. Honestly I’m probably going to unhaul this book because I really don’t see the point of keeping it after how much I hated it. I am disappointed because I was really excited for this and was expecting it to be a five star read. I think it sounded better than it was to be honest. This is definitely disappointing eye candy.
Divine World of Books 