Book Review: Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth

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Mad Mabel  by Sally Hepworth  is a domestic thriller about the youngest person convicted of murder in Australia, Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick. Now 81 years old, Elsie is living on Kenny Lane and has been for the past sixty years. When a mother named Roxanne moves into Mabel's neighborhood with her seven year old daughter, an unlikely friendship forms between Elsie and the seven year old child named Persephone. As Elsie's secrets come to light, her world comes crashing down.  Having read quite a few novels by Sally Hepworth, I requested an Advanced Readers Copy (ARC) of Mad Mabel  without reading the synopsis of the story. I was thrilled when NetGalley and St. Martin's Press approved my request. The expected publication date of the book is April 21, 2026. Not knowing anything about the storyline before I started reading Mad Mabel  made the story much more interesting to me as I had no preconceived ideas. The tale was told from Mabel's perspective in alternating timeli...
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Book Review: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

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great gatsby f scott fitzgerald
As a high school student, I absolutely loved reading The Great Gatsby. I was enchanted with every book we read my junior year, but I remember this one being one of the ones that I enjoyed the most. When one of the book clubs I belong to decided to read this book, I was excited to reread it as I didn't remember a lot about it, and it allowed me to refresh my memory before the Leonardo DiCaprio version of the movie came out. As an adult, I wasn't nearly as enchanted with it as I was as a high school student. 

There isn't a lot of plot to the actual story; the little plot there was moved extremely slow. Basically, Jay Gatsby, the narrator, is a very wealthy man who lives on Long Island in New York and is in love with Daisy Buchanan. He throws a lot of lavish parties where there is a lot of drinking going on. And, then, there is a car accident where a woman ran into the street and was killed by a speeding car.

However, the character development and the visual descriptions were done very well. The descriptions were so good that it really made me dislike all of the characters. They all seemed very self absorbed and unlikable, which is one of the big contributing factors of why I didn't like The Great Gatsby the second time around. I like some of the characters to at least have some redeemable characteristics. Other than there being good character development and visual descriptions, the best thing I can say is that it was an easy, fast read with it being less than 200 pages.

If you enjoyed this book the first time around as a high school student like I did, then I recommend not reading it again as some of the shininess and allure wears off as an adult. My rating is 2 out of 5 stars.


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