Confess by Colleen Hoover Review
After reading Confess, I will admit I was not very impressed with it as I was her other books. I enjoyed Maybe Someday a lot and Ugly Love has to be one of my favorite books of all time, but when reading Confess I did not feel the same as I did with the other novels I have read by Ms. Hoover, at least by the end.
The story is about a young 20 year old women named Aubrey who ends up meeting a art studio owner, 21 year old Owen. When she starts to work at his art studio where he makes art work based on anonymous confessions that are submitted studio. The two soon start to form a relationship, but secrets they are both harboring may be the thing to break them apart.
The novel while I did enjoy the Confession parts (which I discovered were real confessions that the author received from people) and the amazing artwork that was printed in the book, I did not feel as strongly about Auburn and Owen's relationship at first though it grew on me as I read the novel. That is one of the issues I had with the novel.
Warning the Next Section of this Review Contains Spoilers...You've Been Warned...
The biggest issue I had with this novel was in fact the ending. I have read only two other Colleen Hoover novels in my life and while Ugly Love had a perfect ending, I still enjoyed the ending of Maybe Someday even if it was a bit open ended. The ending of this story however, really did not have an ending. Instead of an epilogue at least hinting to where they were in future or even just another chapter in present day, we get a 5 years ago story that felt very unrealistic. While books can make wizards and vampires believable, when you are writing a realistic fiction story, the readers of that story tend to be expecting scenarios that are at least somewhat believable. By having Owen meet Auburn's boyfriend before he dies and in the same hospital she was in just feels very unrealistic. And on top of that the fact that this boyfriend is the person that helped get Owen interested in art, boosted the level of unrealistic scenarios in the novel. I feel that Hoover traded a real conclusion to this story, as she normally gives, just to give us an unrealistic chapter that could of been either cut out or moved to near the end of the book, but not the last chapter. Another issue with this story, and this is just a more a personal bias, I do not really like the trope of people thinking the good guy is bad because of a misunderstanding. It is one of the most annoying tropes especially when it is paired with the audience knowing all of the true story and spending most of the time wanting to yell at the characters the truth. While this is common in many stories, new and old, it is still a trope I feel is very annoying, unoriginal, and not something I enjoy seeing in novels constantly, or at least one that last so long.
So to conclude, I do not exactly think this book is great or anywhere as good as the other books I have read by Colleen Hoover, but there are some good things about this book. I liked the romance, though I did not really love it, the confession were interesting, and the concept of an art studio surrounding them as well as the bonus of the book having the artwork drawn in it on certain pages was fun. However, because of the cliche trope and abrupt/unsatisfying ending I can old give this book 3 out of 5 stars.
*** out of *****
