Reviews with content warning for Adult/minor relationship - Two for Joy

Reviews tagging 'Adult/minor relationship'

Two for Joy by Amy McCulloch, Zoe Sugg

12 reviews

isabelle_mary's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

The ending of this book was AMAZING!! The major plot twist at the end that I never saw coming was written perfectly. I was nervous as to how they were going to have a whole second book, but was not disappointed. It is the perfect amount of mystery along with drama that keeps you reading. I highly suggest this book to anyone who loves a good mystery and a plot twist!

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babsi_222's review against another edition

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adventurous dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

What the fuck??

I think the ending wasn’t good tho, i didn’t see it coming (I thought that Ivy could‘ve done it in book 1 but diminished that thought after a while),now all of her chapters seem stupid and just unsatisfying. The ending was also so aprupt- how will Audrey escape I don’t care but I don’t like that I‘ll never know because of bad writing

I would‘ve given it 4 stars weren’t it for that ending

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rinku's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

Two for Joy is the second book in the The Magpie Society series and sadly couldn’t catch me at all. The main reason for this is that everything about this book just felt a bit flat and that the ending was so rushed and far-fetched.

After the events of the first book, Clover disappeared, and Ivy and Audrey get invitations from the mysterious Magpie Society. Besides being occupied with those two conflicts, they still have to find out who killed Lola and find the murderer before they can kill other people. I had the hope that the story could get more interesting with a new focus on the society. Sadly, this wasn’t the case since

it doesn’t exist since anymore

. To be honest, the introduction of the society had no impact on the story whatsoever and its existence didn’t make sense in the first place which was just wasted potential.

I can’t even say why, but I furthermore didn’t like the mystery elements as much in this book. Some things were a bit cliché and others didn’t make too much sense for me, like

why the girls never told anyone about the relationship between Mr Willis and Lola. So many conflicts could’ve been resolved if they just told anyone. It also sends a bit of a weird signal for younger audiences, to be honest

. After a third, we learn the big conflict of this novel, namely that

the school should be sold, and that Audrey’s dad is part of the deal

. She didn’t know about this before but because of miscommunication, we get some silly conflicts that could’ve been resolved so easily. Many other dramatic things happen, like

Patrick’s flat burning down together with Clover

but they barely had any impact on me since they were described so unemotionally.

But like I’ve said above, what I liked the least about Two for Joy was the kinda rushed and far-fetched ending:

Mr Willis kidnaps Audrey by accident and then decides that he wants to kill her – I think? – but Ivy comes for her rescue. It honestly made no sense that Ivy could run as fast as the car Mr Willis was using. Also, I found him being the perpetrator just a bit unsatisfying, same goes for the solution for the selling of the school which was explained in like two sentences. The ending became more absurd though when it’s revealed that it was Ivy in reality that killed Lola. It’s only told to us that she already knew about the plans about the selling of the school, and it’s implied that she kills Audrey in the end. I hate endings like these since they make the whole story happening before kinda obsolete

. In my opinion, this twist didn’t make any sense at all and made me lower my rating from three to two stars. Additionally, all of this was simply told which made it feel even more unsatisfying.

At least we learned some more information about Ivy and Audrey, especially about their families. I still had a problem with the fact that their voices sound quite similar, leading to me checking for than once whose POV I’m reading right now. Another problem I had with the characters was the romance between Audrey and Teddy. It just felt really flat, and it is only told how it developed the way it did, not shown. In comparison, I shipped Ivy and Audrey so much and wished that they would’ve become a couple. It also annoyed me that there was more fighting between the female characters, mostly because of silly things. But oh well, this is just how teenager girls are like.

The Magpie Society as a series had so much potential but sadly, the execution was just not great. It was promised a boarding school book with a murder mystery and a secret society but all of those elements just stay flat. At least with the first book, I liked the plot around the podcast, and it was interesting what effect it had on the school life. But this plot is abandoned in the second book and is replaced by a not so interesting conflict. If I’m being honest, I probably wouldn’t recommend the series. The first book was at least interesting but this one was just flat and didn’t deliver a satisfying conclusion.

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debbitomsk's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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franticfreya's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

4.25

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honeyduke's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

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norwegianforestreader's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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leahmaslin's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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elisabethkatee's review against another edition

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lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

ugh gosh i don’t even really know what to say - firstly like - who were these books written for ? cause it’s got the simplicity and writing style for like no even a tween, possibley like a 10-12 year old, but then it also has a good mix of swearing here and there so idk. the ending…made no sense. like what why i do not understand. i also really didn’t enjoy just like in the first one how like cringey and set up everything is / was? ALTHOUGH in saying that i guess it can slightly be justified with reasons because of the ending, but still it was like way more dramatic than it needed to be. one chapter audrey’s like that’s it i’m dOne with the Magpie Society and like a few pages later she’s like omg i <3 Ivy and the Magpie Society it means so much to me it’s my life. like sis chill! anyway yeah look i’m not complete against this book it’s not HORRIBLE but it’s also not great - better than the first one for sure.

UPDATE:

okay so after finishing this book and discovering the plot twist i thought maybe i’d flip back through and see if it showed in any parts prior and OKAY WAIT it was actually written a little better than i thought - there’s a LOT of subtle hints that my brain just passed over before without even realising - like yeah the writing style overall is basic but there is little bits hidden in the context behind peoples words that could reveal the twist - i actually really wanna read the whole series again now to see it from a new perspective… ! i upped my star rating by a half hehe <3

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rainbow10's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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