Tampa

The whole premise of this book is off-putting to some, and if that\’s how it strikes you just stop there. Because not only is it about an adult woman preying on 14-year-olds, it\’s quite sexually graphic, and since it\’s written from Celeste\’s perspective, the sex is actually pretty sexy. I\’m not bothered by anything in fiction (no 14-year-old boys were actually harmed in the writing of this book!) so I found it a bit fascinating. Celeste is a great unlikeable protagonist and I thought the story progressed well all the way to its satisfying ending. I actually tried this one in print first and found the quality of the writing inconsistent, but the audio worked much better for me. The narrator somehow made Celeste\’s voice more palatable and I binge-listened to this over the long weekend. I like when authors take risks by tackling taboo subjects, and Alissa Nutting pulled it off quite well.

Draw a line where your comfort zone is, than scribble it out and go beyond it about a million miles… that is about how you will feel about this book. This makes it difficult to formulate a review. Was it well written? Yes. Very. Was it a good story? No. It was terrible. Nothing about it was something that was good and nice. Everything was horrible and disgusting and at times, impossible to listen to. I had to take it in small doses because it left me feeling icky. Is that a reason for a bad review? No. I knew what I was picking up. It wasn\’t a mystery. It\’s a story about a very disturbed and selfish woman that was a predator. Not even the ending is feel good. All of that being said, it was addictive. Like a train wreck, I couldn\’t get away from it. There was no way I couldn\’t finish it. The narration was great. Perfect for this character and the she did good with the voices of all the other characters too. My advice? Go in just knowing it\’s going to be uncomfortable and if you have delicate sensibilities, you might want to skip this one.

Celeste is a nympho-hebephile entangled in ambiguous sexual encounters with boys and men. unadulterated depravity, and I liked it,

Despite the subject matter, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It\’s well-written, the characters and setting are fleshed out, Celeste is abhorrent and I disliked her but I recognized she was too smart, corrupt and conniving for the book to end any other way than how it did. Still, she surprised me, sometimes I was outright shocked, others disgusted. The narrator did a fabulous job as well of conveying Celeste\’s lack of emotion, her depravity, her sarcasm, disinterest, odd lust and irritation, her sense for self-preservation in every scene. And all the characters were discernible to my ears. Usually I find female narrators difficult to enjoy, even in books with female main characters, but this is encouraging and has left me hopeful.

The narrator did an excellent job. This book was well-written and thought out. The ending was not ideal but it worked and fit the character very well. If you\’re expecting any soul searching or self improvement you will be disappointed – but that\’s what I liked about it. It was honest. The female lead is extremely immature which in my opinion is part of the reason she seeks young boys. There is no growth. She is selfish and owns it. It\’s not nearly as graphic as I expected. There is some shock value but a lot of things are glossed over with little detail.

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