I feel like you can’t move for Colleen Hoover at the moment, on social media. She’s everywhere and it makes me laugh to think of my friend who was trying to get me to read ‘It Ends With Us’ about 4/5 years ago, I think of her as the original CoHo stan. It should come as no surprise then that my next book is Verity, as again, it’s everywhere. For this reason, I’m not going to give a full synopsis. I’ll just say, Lowen Ashleigh goes to stay in the Crawford house to take over a popular book series from bestselling author Verity Crawford, who after an injury, is unable to fulfil her contract. Once there, she uncovers some pretty harrowing secrets.
As I've said before I try not to think too much about what to expect from a book or what it may be about before reading it, I like to be surprised and let it take my mind where it wants, without any pre-emptive judgements. Especially given how much information there is out there on it, book reviews, BookToks etc... I try to not let it affect my view of the book.
I read it quite quickly and finished it at 2am one morning because I couldn’t put it down, once I was coming to the end. I enjoyed it and I can definitely see where the hype has come. It’s like nothing I've ever read before, or a story I’ve ever come across so for that reason I loved it. It was intense, traumatic and even a bit much at times, (this coming from someone that has watched every single episode of Law & Order SVU.) The back of the book promises "a twist that will leave you reeling", and while yes it left me reeling, I didn’t particularly enjoy it. I kept imagining other scenarios as I read, that Verity and Jeremy were in it together and had lured Lowen to their house, or that Verity is faking her injuries and biding her time to do something sinister. I felt like this particular twist explained everything away and I hate when a book does that. It almost makes it feel like getting there wasn't worth it. Plus, I was left with a lot of questions, a big fat WHY overall, first of all? IYKYK. Why sleepwalking was a back story for Lowen, I don’t particularly think it was needed and why she was ok with Jeremy lying to her?? Just a lot really. By the time I had finished, I thought the characters weren't particularly deserving of that ending either. Lowen was dry, Verity just... psychotic and I don't think you should ever trust a man called Jeremy.
Since finishing it, I have read other reviews and also ended up on a thread on Reddit discussing whether you are #TeamManuscript or #TeamLetter, which is quite an interesting debate. The majority of people seem to be #TeamManuscript, including me, purely because I think it makes it a better story. #TeamLetter like I said is almost accepting that the whole story can be excused and explained away and I think both Verity and Colleen Hoover are too clever for that.
I gave it 4* on Goodreads because I do think it is very well written, the way it weaves between the autobiographical manuscript 'So Be It' and the story Lowen tells of going to live in the Crawford house. Also, as far as thrillers go (which I believe is not Colleen Hoovers usual choice of genre) is pretty good. I have two different kinds of love for a book. One, I love it that much I’ll race through it not stopping to draw breath; and two, I have to stop reading every so often because it’s so overwhelming and I don’t want it to end. This one was definitely a race through kind of book, because I couldn't put it down.
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