All The Dirty Parts - Daniel Handler Review

First of all thank you to NetGalley for providing me with the ARC for this – however all opinions are my own. 

You can pre-order this on Amazon UK and is due to release on the 19th October 2017!

This was an  . .  interesting and strange read to say the least. First of all, I obviously can’t speak or how true the subjects that this book deals with as I’m a woman and this is a book about a teenage boy which I have no first-hand experience with. I do feel however that the depiction of a teenage by in this book isn’t really one of a typical teenage boy – Cole was literally sex-obsessed to the point where he states that he’s taking an art class because of the ratio of girls to boys and how most of the boys who are in the class are gay – but oh he enjoys the drawing let’s not forget!

There wasn’t really a plot to this as such, it just seemed to be us following Cole though his school year in snippets here and there. I understand there is a message in this and that Cole learns a lesson and gets to see what it’s like to no longer be wanted by the person he’s in love with which was good to watch as it happened organically and didn’t feel forced. I liked the Alec story arc and what it represented and I could actually see that perhaps happening in real life, especially in modern times with more younger adults being open with their sexuality and willingness to experiment.

 I struggled with how this was written in some places, especially with the dialogue and I found it difficult to discern who was talking in a lot of places. Also, with Alec at the start, I struggled with them talking online and it got confusing as to if they were talking in person or nor and again who was actually talking. 

I didn’t mind the explicitness of the book; it’s meant to be an adult novel and I enjoyed that it didn’t shy away for “all the dirty parts”, so-to-speak and it added to the authenticity of how the story is being told. Just note that it is explicit and therefore isn’t suitable for children or less mature young adults.

Overall I did like the book but with the lack of plot and the issues I had with the way it was written I only gave it 2 stars.

Close to Home - Cara Hunter Review

First of all, I just want to mention that I received this from Penguin UK as I was a winner of the giveaway for this book on goodreads. This did not affect my views or opinions on this book and this post isn’t sponsored.

“Last night, 8-year-old Daisy Mason disappeared from her parents' summer party. No one in the quiet suburban street saw anything - or at least that's what they're saying. 


DI Adam Fawley is trying to keep an open mind. But he knows that nine times out of ten, it's someone the victim knew.

That means someone is lying.

And that Daisy's time is running out…“


This is the first book in the DI Adam Fawley series and author Cara Hunter’s debut novel. I absolutely loved this an so glad that I managed to get hold of it early! The overall pace of the book was great and I didn’t feel like I had I had to drag myself through any part of the book. The only issue I had as with the epilogue as I felt it was a bit hard to believe and far fetched BUT I still gave the book five-stars because you could probably just ignore the epilogue if I’m being honest haha!

The book has no chapters; just page breaks which, when I first took a quick flick through the book, I thought I was going to dislike – I’m a massive chapter advocate and hate it when there are long chapters that just seem to drag on so I really thought that I was going to have an issue getting through this. I had no problems though; the page breaks are obvious enough that you’re not left guessing if the story has moved on completely or just taken a break from that current situation. 

The best part of this book is the inclusion of all the twitter and facebook updates. It made it seem like it was actually modern and also really helped understand how things can escalate. There’s a part where it’s showing online hate towards the one of the suspects and how easily it escalated. And it also helped show how easily things can get leaked online by people who don’t been necessarily realising they’re doing so. I felt these social media updates added so much more to the book and I really enjoyed having them there.

I also liked how we kept up with the investigation in real time but also got some flashbacks which helped add even more to the real-time story we were following. Every time there was a development in the case we were there for it and got it follow it though; there were no higher agencies making discoveries which we get told about but not actually getting to follow; you literally get to hear about every detail. 

The character development was ok but I felt like we could have had more of an introduction to Adam, especially since he was the main character in all this. We got a bit; we know his wife’s name and that they’ve had a hard time with some issue with their child but that’s about it and I would have liked to know a bit more about him and his life. Although I really enjoyed the character development of Sharon and Barry Mason and felt that it really helped the story and it's plot line realistic. 

I thought I had a pretty good idea of who'd done it until the end few pages and the way the plot develops really helped to enforce the readers thought of who the suspect is which gave for a more interesting finish when it turns out to be not what you're expecting!

Overall, I think this was a fantastic book and I’m eagerly awaiting the sequel! Hopefully we'll get to see more of who Adam is a a character and more about what happened to his son. You can pre-order this here on amazon UK for its release in December.