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When No One Is Watching
December 2020: Other Books
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When No One is Watching, by Alyssa Cole- 4 Stars
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I really wanna read this! I have yet to read her romance, but when I saw she was doing a thriller I got super excited. I will definitely read this at some point, but I would also like to try one of her romances.
The creepy intense vibes- 5 stars
The unreliable narrator- 5 Stars
The pacing- 3 stars
The 'twist'- Predicted it from the beginning, 3 stars
The ending- WTF just happened, 3 stars.
Rounding this out to 4 stars. I'd still suggest people to read this. I think it's well deserved of the hype. This is largely a mystery/thriller. But there is so much more to it. The neighborhood is rooted in history, we learn to love the characters, the narrators, the world. Then we are spun around, made to question everything, and the story builds and build, until the ending explodes all over the place.
This is narrate by two voices. Firstly, Sydney, a black divorcee who has just moved back to her neighborhood to tend to her dying mother. Secondly, Theo- a white man who just moved in with his "lululemon" basic girlfriend who sucks. Strange things start happening in the neighborhood, and both characters start questioning everything. When does watching over your shoulder become full blown conspiracy theories. When you are no longer safe, and don't know who you can trust- what can you do?
I (a non-black person) thought Sydney's voice was super strong, and helped me see one aspect of the nuance of being black-and honestly, a lot of seemed exhausting and infuriating. I really felt her paranoia, her complexities, and the struggle between her thoughts, emotions, her projections, and how this is reflected in her relationships. We see the microaggressions, and the full blown racist aggressions, all while she has to be "the put together one" to not seem the angry black women.
The twist of (view spoiler)[.her mom being dead, and later Drea being dead (hide spoiler)] I thought was super obvious. So the halfway reveal didn't seem as exciting for me. Then the ending kind of ran off the rails and was too fast, too much, and then BOOM it ended.