 Another episode of RAPT! I had this series ongoing in December and I really enjoyed doing it. It helps me read more because it's only one book for a vlog so it doesn't feel very intimidating. And I basically made a decision that at least for the first couple months of the year, at least for the first half of the year, we're going to continue the series. I know, I hear you all cheering right now. So we're going to keep doing it once a month and this was actually supposed to be happening later in January, like towards the end of January. But like I am struggling, struggling to read. This is exactly what I was afraid of. Like it's just not happening for me at the start of the year. I'm like four books behind schedule. Like it's not good, like it needs to change. So I thought I would bump this up because you love it, I love it, we all love it. And let's read a book. Let's pick a book and wrap it and read it, okay? So these are still all 2021 new releases that I haven't read. I feel like when we first did it, we were unwrapping a lot of hardbacks. I'm feeling like a paperback today. And I'm also feeling like green. What is she green? Well, Taymar, have you ever watched the show? We're gonna, okay, what green paperbacks? This one or this one? I hate it. I hate choosing these. I feel so nervous. Okay, I'm gonna go with this one because this one's quite short. And so I feel like we may not have like much to talk about in a vlog. So this one's a bit longer. Oh my god, I'm gonna cry. So let's go with this one, okay? Can you see what it is? Yeah. Oh my god. Okay, so we've got The Appeal by Janice Hallett, which is one of the books I was most excited to read in general this year, like to get to this year. I am so, so excited for this. So if you don't know, this is a murder mystery in this quaint English town, but it's told entirely through emails and texts and letters and stuff like that. So the whole book is told through emails, etc. So I feel like this is actually the perfect thing for me right now because I feel like it will probably get me out of my kind of slump that I've had at the start of the year quite quickly. And oh my god, I am feel blessed. Wrapped up is really kind to me. I feel like wrapped up just like gets me. Like also Janice Hallett's next one is coming out, like I think the next couple months. So I'm glad I'm going to get to read this, figure out if I like her stuff, and then I can keep reading her stuff if I do. Oh my god. Okay, I'm going to go to the gym now, and then I will come back and hopefully start reading this this evening. Okay, so before we get into it, I just need to clear the room, you know, I need to get something off my chest. So obviously you saw me unwrap this, okay? But I since went and I bought this. So I never do this, okay? I just want to say like I never buy another edition of a book even before I read it, right? But my mum had read this, and she just like gotten shit on it, and it just made me sad reading it. So I went and I bought the hardcover. This didn't exist when I bought this, otherwise I would have never bought this. I love hardbacks more. This is like kind of clothy. I just love it. I just absolutely love it. It brings me so much more joy. I didn't spend any money on it because I had Waterstones credit, so I didn't even spend any money, and I got this for half price anyway. So really, I've spent less buying these two books than this cost normally. So I don't want to hear any critiques. I don't want to hear any critiques. I don't want to hear anything. It's a haters. I'm not your enemy. I'm your hero. You know, share up. You should be happy I'm here. But now I'm going to survive this morning so now I'm going to be reading from this one. Let's chat about this. So the appeal we are in, this quaint English town, very ectocristy, and we're actually following this group of people which is like an adult's amateur drama society where they put on shows. And I actually, what honestly is so fun for me to read is when I was a kid, I was in the kid's version of an adult's theatre society like this. That's what I went to, to go act. And so I remember the kinds of people you would get in these groups. There's often more elderly people and you often have a lot of families in it like parents and children. And that's what this is like. So like I'm like, just tell us how it lived near me. Like, is this based off of what I know? It's a conspiracy theory that I'm actually interested in. Or is this just a very like common occurrence? So it's making it really fun for me to read because I'm like, I know these people. When there's like a meddling, like like an uptight person, I know who that is. When there's a family situation and how that makes it a bit awkward for everyone else. Like, I know this. I've lived this. So that's really fun for me to read. And it is told entirely through most the emails. There's a few text messages. I feel like some of the characters, I'm like, you wouldn't be emailing each other. Like the younger characters, I'm like, why are we doing emails here? Like that doesn't really make sense to me, but like I'll take it, we'll go along with it, whatever. I'm a hundred pages in. So I feel like it's taken me up until now, recently, to like get a hold of what's happening and to kind of understand everything. It definitely took me a while to like understand all the different characters we've got going on. It reads very fast. So it's not like a hundred pages of a normal book. Do you know what a normal book? Like a traditionally written book. Do you know what I mean? It's very different. It's like a much faster pace reading experience having to read between the lines a lot. But I'm really enjoying it. I'm loving the setting. Like I said, the characters, we've got a very big cast of characters, but it's super interesting. And we are kind of reading from the perspective of these two detectives who are going through this with us and trying to figure it out. Now, I only have some theories as to what's going on, but I feel like those theories are going to get solved pretty quickly and we're going to constantly kind of have new mysteries going on throughout it. We don't even know what the case or what the death, I assume there's a death involved in this, like who that is or what's happened. We don't know any of that. We've really started from the beginning. And so we're kind of going through the before. Do you know what I mean? It's not like a normal mystery where like the murders happened and the rest of the book is trying to solve it. This is like leading up to the murder, which I actually really enjoy. I've read a few books I've done that and I've always really enjoyed them. So I'm really enjoying it so far. I can't tell yet if it's going to be like a four or a five. It's kind of feeling like a four at the moment. But like I said, we're very much the beginning so it could really go anywhere. And I'm really enjoying the kind of unique sense of storytelling. So yeah, all I've got to do today is really read this book. So I'm just going to go ahead and chill out and read some of this. Okay. So it's much later. I've been for a run. So excuse the hair. That's just like, I don't even know what it's looking like on camera. Whoa. So I realized when I last checked in with you, I did not tell you the plot of this. I just neglected to tell you the plot. So basically the granddaughter of the kind of heads of the drama group, I think she's got a rare form of cancer. She's only two years old. And so they basically launched an appeal to raise £250,000 for her to get this drug treatment that is not approved on the NHS yet but like is being sold as the cure for her basically. From the beginning, I was like, I don't trust these bitches. Like her family, you know, like the adults. Because it's obvious they're the head hornchos. They are the head hornchos. Like they control the beating heart of the socializing in this tight-knit community. Do you know what I mean? Like they're the rich bitches. So first of all, I'm like, there's a weird power dynamic here. And second of all, I'm like, you have money. That hasn't really been covered yet that much. But I'm like, you have money. Like I don't trust you. But I feel like in this book, something that's doing really well is making us not trust everyone. Like there's a big character list. And I could go down almost everyone and be like, here's why I don't trust this person. But I kind of want to get into all of them. I was here like 10 years. And one of the main characters of following is this strange character called Izzy who is like obsessed, like obsessed with this other character called Sam. His thing. Reading from Izzy's perspective a lot, she writes, this girl writes a lot of emails and she's annoying. Like it's annoying to read. Like it's not, I'm like, after page 100, I was like, I get the point. You know what I mean? I was like, I understand. Like she's annoying, but like I don't need to read it over and over again. It's not like a five star for me right now. It's probably about a four. It's strange, right? I almost think I need to read Janice Hallett's next book to kind of get used to this style where other books I've read have been mixed media but haven't been solely like one form of media pretty much. Other books say The Good Girls Guide to Murder has mixed media elements interspersed. Well, the Illuminae series has mixed media but it's a lot of different forms of mixed media, right? Whereas this is all emails. It's just email after email after email with occasional text messages sewn in but they're not that different to the emails. And like constantly read, all I'm reading is people's email tone. Do you know what I mean? Like you write emails in a different tone to that you speak or to you text or you whatever, you know? And it's a bit like, it's a lot. You know, like I wish this could have been not just emails, which I'm intrigued as to whether Janice Hallett's next one is only emails or if maybe it has other mixed media because that's what I feel like this is crying out for. I mean, actually, I liked you. There's been like one or two police reports maybe but that has literally been it. One or two newspaper articles but like when I'm talking, I want a variety. I think like every other, you know, everything should be different. You're constantly going into different forms of mixed media if your whole book is going to be mixed media. And so it's getting a little bit like a lot. Like it's getting a little bit like, okay, like constantly reading in people's email tone of voice that they use is strange. This is not for me. No, I don't know. And I don't know if I love that element of it but I will say I love how this book is really keeping you on your toes because you don't have like a detective or a narrator to kind of affirm things you find out. You kind of have to find like clues out. You have to read between the lines and you have to make, you have to assure yourself that the conclusion you reach from that piece of information is right rather than in a mystery having a detective get a piece of information and then a detective coming to the conclusion. You're kind of like having to do that for yourself which is a very interesting reading experience as well. So I am enjoying it but it's just like the emails are a lot. Like I wish there was some stuff that weren't emails. And I'm kind of ready for the murder to happen. You know right from the beginning it's in the kind of synopsis that a murder is going to happen. And I'm like, girlies the tension is rising. Let's get a killing because it feels like we just need something to move the story on a bit. It's not a five star which I feel like I'm a bit disappointed that it's not. I feel like maybe you can tell in my demeanour because I wanted this to be an all-time favourite and it could be. Like it could turn it around in this last bit and just go absolutely apeshit but I'm still really enjoying it. So I feel like me sounding disappointed doesn't do it justice because I still aren't having a great time reading it. I just wanted it to be like an all-time favourite if that makes sense. If I speak I am in big trouble. In big trouble. So disappointed. I'm just gonna throw it out there. I'm just gonna say it. I'm just gonna say it. 3.5 stars. It's not the vibe. Stop! I'm giving it 3.5 stars. Okay? 3.5. For me I think in the end the repetitiveness of the emails it got a bit old for me. And the structure of the story actually didn't work for me. You know the murder happens at probably the 75% mark and then we suddenly stop having emails and we get into this really long document that the two like detectives or are they lawyers? I don't even know. Yes these two law students are writing to try and like propose what they think happened. And so then that is repetitive and then like I feel like at no stage in the book was there enough variation. There was like clear blocks in like what was being written. Do you know what I mean? But like I feel like everything should have been mixed together a bit more. Like something that I feel like the guest list for example did so well. In one perspective or in the past following up to the day of the wedding when there is a death. And then in the other perspective you're in the night of the wedding trying to figure out what's going on. And that worked so well because you are leading up to the death, the murder like we are in this one. But you're also in the present sometimes. I just feel like this book was a bit too... It felt a bit stagnant. It felt a bit stuck in itself at points to me. And that's the truth. But I will say I really loved the experience of reading it. Like I read this so fast you could not pry it off my hands. I was flying through it and I still had a great time reading it. But I don't come out of it going oh I really loved that or I really really enjoyed it and I can't see many flaws with it. Like there are some flaws for me so that's why it's a 3.5. But funny enough like I am really excited like really really excited to read the author's next book which has just come out which I think is more to do with codes and stuff like that. I think before I buy it I may go have a look at it in person and see kind of what the layout on the inside is like because it just felt like it needed a bit more variation throughout for me. I will say I also think I thought the the resolution to the murder was a good one. It was one that felt satisfying. Yeah I don't know I feel like this had a lot of possibility but it just didn't quite hit the mark. And I don't think this is a good place to start with murder mysteries if you haven't read a lot of them because the structure is a little bit confusing like the kind of getting all of these emails and leading up to the death but the death taking like 75% to happen it's I don't think it's conducive to like starting with murder mysteries but a lot of people have loved this this has been super successful but for me it just it just missed the mark. I feel like I am becoming a little more picky with murder mysteries though perhaps if I had read this when I was a bit of a bit of a newbie to the genre to the you know the idea of that of those books I would have enjoyed it more but I feel like I've just seen this done better and I also felt like some of the tropes and some of the reveals were a little bit like stereotypical were a little bit like I've seen this story before which whereas with my murder mysteries I know it's really hard but I want the reveals to be something a little bit new so yeah I really enjoyed reading it I'm really excited to read the author's next book but I was still disappointed and I did still feel a little bit let down by the book so listen was a little bit of sad because this was like a beyond a five star prediction for me I'm still glad I got this edition because I love it so much more and I really like I'm gonna it's gonna bring me joy seeing this on my shelves regardless but but yeah I don't know I'm really sad because this was like beyond a five star prediction for me it was like a ten star prediction and it wasn't that but it's okay listen like I said I'm gonna continue reading anything there's author rights because it's still it's really hard to find modern murder mysteries do you know what I mean so yeah that's where we're ending it I'm sorry guys if you wanted better from me but that's what we're getting um if you've gone to the end leave a red heart emoji because I love this edition so leave a red heart emoji if you've gone to the end let me know if you thought of this if you read it I know a lot of you have read it like from not my recommendation but from me talking about it and a lot of you've been commenting recently like some of you saying you loved it some of you saying you found it a bit disappointing so I'd love to know what you thought if you read it especially in response to what I've said and thank you so much for watching and I'll see you very soon in another video bye