Sadie by Courtney Summers5 stars
“Every little thing about you can be a weapon, if you’re clever enough.”
The podcast The Girls covers the disappearance of nineteen-year-old Sadie. Sadie is not from an easy background. Raised by an alcoholic and drug addicted mother with boyfriends in and out of her life, Sadie practically raised her younger sister, Maddie. Sadie has gone missing for a reason. She wants revenge against the man who killed Maddie and took everything from her. She won’t stop until he’s dead. Told from the alternating perspective of a podcast tracking Sadie down and Sadie’s journey for justice, we are met with secret after buried secret being unearthed. If you haven’t added Sadie to your must-read list for 2019, let me urge you to do so. I have recently read two Courtney Summers novels, All the Rage, and they have both been some of the staples of YA literature. This gives me hope for the genre because of young readers are able to consume a novel with such a profound theme, as well as intellectual storytelling, then I’m excited to see where the market continues to. The audiobook for this was stunning and left me breathless. I couldn’t stop listening and I needed to know what was going to happen next to Sadie. Summers really shows her skill as a writing and storytelling with two alternating mediums of style. The podcast added an extra layer of mystery and development. This was excellently done and a page-turning shocker. Sadie is one of my favorite novels of 2019 so far. I can’t recommend it enough.
Whimsical Writing Scale: 5
“But love is complicated, it’s messy. It can inspire selflessness, selfishness, our greatest accomplishments and our hardest mistakes. It brings us together and it can just as easily drive us apart. It can drive us.”
The characters in this novel are full of depth. They will turn your stomach and make you weep. Sadie looks at the worst of humanity. This novel is filled with horrible people who commit horrible crimes for their own pleasure and joy.
Sadie, herself, is a woman filled with emptiness. She has a stutter and is marked as an idiot by most people and growing up in a poverty-ridden trailer park doesn’t give her much credit to those judging her, but Sadie has spunk. She has a drive and a pocket knife and she refuses to let anyone walk over her. I loved following her. She is layered and complex. She’s an anti-hero. A girl looking to save other girls from the sick world of sick predators, but who has made her fair share of bad decisions. Sadie is human and she speaks for humanity.
Kick-Butt Heroine Scale: 5
“I’m going to kill a man. I’m going to steal the light from his eyes. I want to watch it go out. You aren’t supposed to answer violence with more violence but sometimes I think violence is the only answer.”
I loved the flashbacks of Sadie, but also the recounting of Sadie and Maddie’s relationship. I felt the pain every single time Sadie reflected or anyone spoke of the sweet little girl who was brutally murdered. This story is heavy on emotion and at times felt devastating, but moments and character relationships like this were so important. West’s podcast is a layer that I love. I loved how he didn’t want to follow Sadie and was very uninterested at first and then he becomes the biggest advocator for finding her. The way the story ended with the podcast telling the story instead of following Sadie will be sure to frustrate many readers, but I absolutely loved the ambiguity and either way Sadie won. Sadie proved that she is a survivor of her past to save someone’s future. This story means so much to me as a reader because of its ambiguity and the strength of the author in letting the reader hope for a better outcome [whether you believe Sadie died or lived I think both outcomes have a positive meaning. I personally, believe Sadie died. I believe she fought and fought like an animal wounded fighting their last battle before death. She fought the monster who hurt her and her sister and she won by killing him. He died and that’s where this story wins. Monsters don’t live forever. Eventually they fade away. (hide spoiler)]
Character Scale: 5
The Villain- Scum of the earth. Sadie meets a man connected to her sister’s murderer and he groomed this man into being a monster, but to see how Sadie influenced his demise was so amazing. The monster who did those things to the sisters though… words can’t describe my instant dislike for such a character, but men like this are real and that’s what sickens my soul.
Villain Scale: 5
This is a novel that everyone should read. I can’t stop thinking about it. Everyone needs to read this because it is a novel for the young girls of our world.
Plotastic Scale: 5
Cover Thoughts: One of my all-time favorite covers.
I Know You Know by Gilly Macmillan
3.5 stars
Twenty years ago, two adolescent boys were brutally murdered in the city of Bristol. A young man was convicted of the crimes, but questions are still there about whether or not he actually did it. Cody Swift can’t escape the fact that he should’ve died with his best friends and now Cody wants to speak up. The podcast he has created will prove that this case wasn’t closed and he wants Jess to speak up. But Jess has put the death of her son behind her and the life she once lived is in the past, but these people will stop at nothing to keep their secrets buried and some people keep unbury the wrong ones. This had so much potential. When I first heard about this thriller, I was excited because I love the podcast medium that is being introduced in thrillers—especially for a cold case that wasn’t really solved. The problem is that this book is LONG and full of unnecessary characters. Macmillan has good ideas, but this novel feels like several novels packed into one. The suspense was constantly waning and then coming back and then dying again. I was never hooked and invested until the very end, but that is far too late to get me to care about the actual revelations. Macmillan is a competent writer of suspense, but I’m not sure if she is a competent writer of characters. That’s why this book failed for me.
Whimsical Writing Scale: 3.5
We follow three characters: Jess, Cody, and Detective John Fletcher. Cody’s chapters/podcast was the most interesting and alluring part of the novel. I was on my toes and interested in the admissions, but also with the chase. Jess’s character was a mess. This woman was so unlikable, but she was redeemable and at the end, I was shouting for joy because keeping secrets for so long never do anybody any good. Detective John was boring and I don’t know why I had to follow him. He offered nothing new to story and it was a layer that could’ve been axed and it would’ve improved the story ten-fold.
Character Scale: 3
The Villain- I suspected but can I say that I’m disappointed. It was shocking to me because I couldn’t and didn’t care by the time it was revealed. This big twist came after the novel felt done. It made the experience worth listening to, but I’m not sure if this is a competent and well-done thriller. I’m not sold.
Villain Scale: 3.25
Overall, I Know You Know has promise and if you are a fan of podcast thrillers, then you will appreciate this one. It didn’t do what I thought it was going to and I’m still disappointed by it. However, I think that a lot of readers will be sucked into the slow-burn uncovering and twisted game that has existed for over twenty-years for these characters.
Plotastic Scale: 3.5
Cover Thoughts: It’s a thriller cover for sure.
3.5 stars
Twenty years ago, two adolescent boys were brutally murdered in the city of Bristol. A young man was convicted of the crimes, but questions are still there about whether or not he actually did it. Cody Swift can’t escape the fact that he should’ve died with his best friends and now Cody wants to speak up. The podcast he has created will prove that this case wasn’t closed and he wants Jess to speak up. But Jess has put the death of her son behind her and the life she once lived is in the past, but these people will stop at nothing to keep their secrets buried and some people keep unbury the wrong ones. This had so much potential. When I first heard about this thriller, I was excited because I love the podcast medium that is being introduced in thrillers—especially for a cold case that wasn’t really solved. The problem is that this book is LONG and full of unnecessary characters. Macmillan has good ideas, but this novel feels like several novels packed into one. The suspense was constantly waning and then coming back and then dying again. I was never hooked and invested until the very end, but that is far too late to get me to care about the actual revelations. Macmillan is a competent writer of suspense, but I’m not sure if she is a competent writer of characters. That’s why this book failed for me.
Whimsical Writing Scale: 3.5
We follow three characters: Jess, Cody, and Detective John Fletcher. Cody’s chapters/podcast was the most interesting and alluring part of the novel. I was on my toes and interested in the admissions, but also with the chase. Jess’s character was a mess. This woman was so unlikable, but she was redeemable and at the end, I was shouting for joy because keeping secrets for so long never do anybody any good. Detective John was boring and I don’t know why I had to follow him. He offered nothing new to story and it was a layer that could’ve been axed and it would’ve improved the story ten-fold.
Character Scale: 3
The Villain- I suspected but can I say that I’m disappointed. It was shocking to me because I couldn’t and didn’t care by the time it was revealed. This big twist came after the novel felt done. It made the experience worth listening to, but I’m not sure if this is a competent and well-done thriller. I’m not sold.
Villain Scale: 3.25
Overall, I Know You Know has promise and if you are a fan of podcast thrillers, then you will appreciate this one. It didn’t do what I thought it was going to and I’m still disappointed by it. However, I think that a lot of readers will be sucked into the slow-burn uncovering and twisted game that has existed for over twenty-years for these characters.
Plotastic Scale: 3.5
Cover Thoughts: It’s a thriller cover for sure.
Are you a fan of audiobooks? Have you read any thrillers with podcasts in them? Are you a fan of either of these novels? Let me know down below in the comments!
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