User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
ETA: You can read an excerpt of Nothing More to Tell here: https://ew.com/books/karen-mcmanus-no...
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Should be able to share the title of this one soon!
Rating: really liked it
NEW KAREN M. McMANUS!!!
I appreciate so much the publisher keeping the covers all in a similar style. These will all look amazing as a set on my shelves. I can't wait for my copy to arrive!
Original:Who needs a title, a cover, or really any information at all?
I
will be reading this in 2022. That's not a predication.
Rating: really liked it
This week I started my YA readathon: in two days I found two BIGGEST WINNERS! Which is like hitting the jackpot. Because sometimes in one year I nearly read more than hundreds of books written in same genre, sulking with disappointment. But right now I’m truly feeling euphoric, a little exhausted because of extra adrenaline rush!
Firstly I read Agathas and gave my five blazing stars! And now I just read Karen M. McManus’ best book!
I read all of her works including her most popular duology of One of us is lying! But this book is definitely my favorite: better developed characterization, well executed dark academia mystery and dual POV story telling blew my mind!
Choosing to tell the story from two likable characters’ perspectives was the main strength of this book make it better than her previous works. ( multi POVed storytelling was a little riskier because it gets confusing and when you don’t root for each character, it turns out as excruciatingly painful experience)
This time: both Tripp and Brynn ( the author always chooses interesting names for her heroines! ) are main characters, students of St. Ambrose School, who were once close friends, till Tripp does something extra mean to humiliate Brynn.
After their teacher Mr. Larkin’s bludgeoned body is found in the woods, Brynn moved to Chicago when her father gets a new job offer. But she is haunted by the mystery and she never gets over it. After 4 years later, they’re back! Brynn has to return back to same school where her teacher was killed, his murderer has never found and three students: two elites: Shawn and Charlotte and her ex best friend- her new nemesis Tripp made a pact not to talk about it!
Brynn gets accepted by her dream job: true crime show “Motive”, pitches her idea about Mr. Larkin’s unsolved murder, encouraged by the producers to dig out more!
That means she has to work undercover, investigating her school friends including elite trio who found the body. That means she has to bury the hatchet and reluctantly make peace with her nemesis Tripp to learn what secrets he keeps from everyone!
What if Mr. Larkin is not an angel as everybody mentioned? What if there are so many people have motives to get rid of him?
Well, I truly enjoyed the mystery! My favorite character was Tripp. I truly felt sorry how much burden he had to carry for his young age. Interestingly both Tripp and Brynn were most likable characters the author ever created.
That’s why I’m giving my first five stars to one of her works. ( I enjoyed the previous ones but character department always failed for me or some plot hole always bugged me to give more stars)
I can honestly say! This is one of the best works of the year! You shouldn’t dare to miss it!
Special thanks to NetGalley and Random House Children’s / Delacorte Press for sharing this amazing digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest thoughts.
Rating: really liked it
KMM is back! her last two books were underwhelming for me, so i am pleasantly surprised by how entertaining this newest one is!
nothing mind-blowingly outstanding, but it has the right combination of easy writing and quick pacing, enjoyable characters (i think tripp of one of the best characters KM has ever written) and a plot that keeps the reader engaged.
had i read this as a teenager, it would have definitely gotten 5 stars.
↠ 4 stars
Rating: really liked it
Now available!!Published Aug 30, 2022Oh, good to know I haven’t completely lost the ability to write a review immediately after finishing it! We will all just collectively ignore how long it took me to read in the first place.
The premise of
Nothing More to Tell immediately felt like something more conceivable as a vehicle to tell a murder mystery involving teenagers. There’s still the standard McManus (and to be honest, probably a genre standard at this point) rotating perspectives, but this time only split between two characters. And if you are keeping track of her trademark Too Trendy Names, this time around we are working with Brynn and Tripp so…..yeah. McManus strikes again! I could have sworn at the outset that she’d actually done Brynn already, but no, I was just thinking of Bronwyn (lol) from One of Us Is Lying.
There’s a few flashes to scenes from the past around the time their teacher at Saint Ambrose, Mr. Larkin, was found dead in the woods behind the school by Tripp and two other kids in middle school. But for the most part we get the exposition either as narration or through Brynn’s investigation of the cold case murder as an intern for a true crime show, Motive. Structuring the plot this way was a smart move, as my biggest complaint with McManus’s last book was how much of my disbelief had to be suspended for even a fraction of the situations those kids found themselves in to be plausible. Here, Brynn had access to police files and investigative tools, not to mention an excuse to pursue the case with gusto, that didn’t rely on happenstance to uncover major twists.
As for my enjoyment of the book, I think I appreciated the mechanics of it more than I really loved reading it. Like, I wasn’t frantically flipping through the pages, but I did keep picking it back up. I also think this could be the potential launching pad for McManus’s next series or spin-offs on One of Us Is Back rounds off that trilogy next year. If that’s not the case, I’ll probably bump my rating down a level because many of the threads she left dangling would have been done unintentionally. Though as of now it just feels like a dozen red herrings were stuffed into a story and then promptly abandoned once they no longer served it.
Speaking of, I cannot get over how abrupt the final climax was. I thought You'll Be the Death of Me was rushed, but this??? I can’t go beyond that it started out of nowhere and ended minutes later with all the fanfare of a speed bump without getting into spoilers, but just know I had to put my kindle down to laugh alone in my room for several more minutes before I could start again. But this didn’t impact the plot as much as you’d expect; there’s an epilogue twist that is the main reason I suspect a follow-up to this one that I actually think could be really interesting if done well. So I guess we’ll see.
But truthfully I do not keep coming back to these books because I am expecting ingenious plot devices and mind-blowing twists. I am here exclusively for the consistent readability and the scratchy-face covers. And despite not reaching the level of a couple of her earlier novels, McManus delivers on both of those things here as well.
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Thank you to Delacorte Press, Get Underlined and Netgalley for an advance review copy!**For more book talk & reviews, follow me on Instagram at @elle_mentbooks!
Rating: really liked it
Even her untitled books are suspenseful😌✨
I wish I knew what this is about!!
Rating: really liked it
4.25/5
Reading this book, I was instantly pulled into the mystery. Brynn was, for the most part, an extremely likeable MC. She isn’t my favourite (Ellery still has that honour) but she wasn’t annoying at all, and did things logically. Tripp, on the other hand, annoyed me for half of the book before I started to like him, but I don’t think many others will have that problem with him.
I am annoyed that in every YA mystery we need a moralizing sections where the MC regrets ever looking into the mystery and starts hating herself. Like, why can’t we have an MC go for the case and not hurt her family because they actually support her?? But no it’s the same spiel of looking for a killer is wrong if you hurt your friends and family by not telling them everything. It’s getting annoying.
I was so convinced this would be another 4.5 read from Karen M McManus, but the ending had me remove .25 from it. Why? Because this was single-handedly the most abrupt ending to any mystery I have ever read. I was reading an e -book, so please just imagine my shock when I thought the killer would show up and instead turned the page to see EPILOGUE written at the top. I was so confused. Seriously I thought I had skipped pages. The ending should have been 20 pages longer at least and more concrete than it was. The identity and explanation of the killer really didn’t make sense to me, given how it was presented. I also don’t know how Brynn was willing to not let the case become actually solved?? After all the work she was just fine letting the killer go??
I think that if this book has a sequel, it could be very interesting. If it doesn’t, though, there are many things left unsolved and many odd sentences I thought would be expanded on but never were. So, if a sequel is planned, this book definitely sets up for it. If there isn’t one, we have some plot holes.
I also am really wanting Ellie to be the MC of the sequel or her own mystery. It was kind of embarrassing that she was the one who basically solved the mystery because without her trap, Brynn and Tripp would probably not have figured it out for a while longer.
Ellie was such a great character, and I would love more of her in the future.
I also loved having references to all the previous mystery cases!!
Overall, it’s a good mystery, but the ending for sure is underwhelming.
Rating: really liked it
*Many thanks to the publisher for providing my review copy.
Rating: really liked it
This was so much fun! This YA-mystery was so brilliantly executed and the way the author weaved the different layers of the story was well done. I really enjoyed it!
Bryn left Saint Ambrose high school following the murder of beloved English teacher Mr. Larkin. His body was discovered in the woods by three students and the case was never solved. Now, four years later Bryn returns home to where it all happened. Determined to nail an internship at a popular true crime show, she pitches the story about the murder of Mr. Larkin. A journalist to her core, Bryn is determined to figure out what happened that day.
The deeper Bryn digs into the case, the more secrets she uncovers. What she finds out will change the lives of all the people she knows and loves.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.
Rating: really liked it
Okay, so I think that this is the best McManus book that I've read recently. I found myself unable to guess the true identity of the killer and it was interesting to see the interconnectedness of all the characters. Nevertheless, this still isn't the best that I've seen McManus do. I think that if you go into this for the fun with lower expectations then you'll enjoy it more. 3.5Nothing More to Tell is McManus' 6th release told in dual perspective of students who were impacted by the murder of a former teacher. Brynn, who previously left the school, returns in hopes of solving the mystery while also working as an intern at a famous true crime show. Readers also get insight to the perspective of Tripp who found the body of Mr. Larkin. Like Brynn, he struggles with understanding who would have killed their teacher.
To be honest, McManus did a great job with the character development in this one. It's one of the few books that she's published where I felt a connection to the characters and their personal struggles. It's also one in which I felt like McManus was able to seamlessly connect the struggles of the characters to the plot. There was a certain level of interconnectedness that I don't always get with YA books that I appreciated. If I had to pick a favorite perspective out of the two characters, it would have to be Tripp. His story ripped my heart to shreds. McManus did an excellent job informing the reader on how the trauma associated with Mr. Larkin's death continued to wreak havoc over Tripp's life. It was also interesting to notice how the dysfunction of his home life informed decisions he made in regard to the murder. There is also a certain level of complexity with the side characters that I also enjoyed.
One of my issues with this book definitely had to do with the overall "layout" of the plot. I loved that McManus proved me wrong on who I thought murdered Mr. Larkin. The sub-plot about his life that informed the rest of the story was extremely interesting, BUT there were too many twists. I don't know if that is going to make sense, but there were too many people that we came close to "revealing" as the killer only for Tripp and Brynn to pull back more evidence to prove that while they were a part of the narrative, they weren't actually the killers. By the time the true killer was revealed, I was exhausted with the reveals and completely underwhelmed by who actually committed the murder. In fact, their reason for committing the murder was a little out there (just my personal opinion). I think that the plot just needed a little more balance. If so, I could have definitely seen this one as being a four star read.
Overall, this was a solid read, but I'm waiting for McManus to blow me away again. If you're interested in great character development with a solid mystery, then you'll probably enjoy this one.
Rating: really liked it
You don’t need any information whatsoever if it’s Karen M. McManus
Rating: really liked it
I feel like expectations with this book might be key. Nothing More to Tell cover & early marketing gave dark academia/prep school vibes. The actual book however, does not really have either of those as a feature.
This feels very much like the other books I've read from McManus- a YA contemporary story with a murder mystery plot engine. If you like what she writes, you will probably like this as well. It's reasonably well-executed for what it is, but definitely not what I went in hoping for.
This follows a teen girl moving back to the town where her 8th grade teacher was found dead in the woods. Now she's getting an internship with a true crime show by pitching his death to them as a story. The second perspective is her childhood best friend who found the body and is now socially entwined with the two other people who were with him in the woods. The investigation quickly becomes deadly and there are a lot of people with secrets. A fair amount of emphasis is on toxic and even abusive family dynamics, as well as on the ways our choices impact other people. This isn't a new favorite for me, but I liked it reasonably well and think fans of McManus will probably like it even better. I received an advance copy of this for review via NetGalley, all opinions are my own.
Rating: really liked it
Not her best, but still entertaining to read and fun to follow behind the leads' shenannigans.
Rating: really liked it
After reading some glowing reviews for McManus’ other books, I decided to take a chance with this new to me author. Well, I have mixed feelings about Nothing More to Tell.
With the exception of characters Shane and Charlotte, both Brynn and Tripp were so similar that I frequently got them confused with each other. I really had to pay attention to the chapter titles to keep me on the straight and narrow. Other than that, the characters in the novel are varied and developed enough. Though I didn’t get a sense of what Brynn’s parents were like.
The story is told from two points of view and two timelines. If you’re not paying attention, you can easily get lost in the narrative — necessitating backtracking. You can probably guess that it happened to me at several points in the novel.
While the whodunnit aspect of the story was engaging, I thought that the idea of high schoolers performing their own murder investigations seemed a bit of a stretch. But given who the target audience is (Teen & YA,) I can see how the narrative was written that way.
There were a few unanswered questions at the end. So I’m guessing that a sequel is in the making. Nothing More to Tell is a decent read. It didn’t have the wow factor that I was expecting though. But from a Teen & YA perspective it probably will rate four glowing stars.
I received a digital ARC from Random Children’s House through NetGalley. The review herein is completely my own and contains my honest thoughts and opinions.
Rating: really liked it
4.1 stars!! A solid story, not my fave of McManus’ but definitely enjoyable.
Rich kids being apart of shady stuff will always be a hit for me, this book is no different. I think the plot set-up was a fun concept, with the true crime at the backbone, pushing the story forward. Since it was true crime heavy, it was fun to see that McManus’ other books had mentions in this novel, to show they do exist in the same universe.
We got dual POV, ex best friends to enemies to strangers to enemies to lovers?? McManus is able to write such great mystery with romance as a subplot, but never letting it lag. Brynn and Tripp are no exception. They have such great chemistry; they have great banter, she’s witty and he broods. Staple tropes.
I actually really loved Brynn, she was a reliable MC, sometimes a little too black and white for her own good though and we see that’s what gets her caught up sometimes. However, at her core, she is so caring and thoughtful for not only her friends and family, bur even for people who don’t like her.
Reading Tripp’s POV was interesting, because the way he saw Brynn was entirely different than the vibes she gave off in her own POV chapters. In his eyes, she was stunning, sarcastic, but never mean and made him laugh. She was his safe haven and I don’t think she ever noticed that till later on.
I will always appreciate dual POVs because it really goes to show how we view ourselves may be completely different than how others view us, neither is right or wrong, but that we’re multi-faceted.
There were some great twists and turns and every time we found answers (or so we thought), it either brought us down a new rabbit hole or a dead end. Many big reveals and I liked where the story ended up.
It’s getting only a 4.1 just because I wasn’t like in shock and awe like I have been in the past when I’ve reached the end of a McManus novel. I still enjoyed it, I just wanted a little more. Nonetheless, fun story, good characters and solid “whodunnit?“.
