1 out of 4 stars
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Lilly?, by Marie Washtag, is a fictional novel. Lilly and Sasha are childhood friends, who ran away from Serbia to Hungary due to a war. Now, Lilly has a decent job while Sasha is involved in organized crime. Later on, Sasha and his business buddies land in trouble, and Lilly, being his closest friend, finds herself in a quagmire.
Exploring the themes of the consequences of crime and keeping bad company, this novel would've been intriguing and engaging if the author had narrated it in depth. Though it has a bit of suspense, it's incoherent. As I was reading, I felt that the author had a good story to tell, but she just didn't know how to craft it. The writing style is immature and therefore, the book is cumbersome. Summarizing the plot was really hard for me because it was poorly developed.
The narrative revolves around drug abuse, the selling of drugs, and sexual assault. Some parts of the story are unrealistic. For example, Lilly, her boss, Eve, and some other persons drank coffee and went to an Italian pizza place to have breakfast soon after they found Adam, Eve's boyfriend, dead. I didn't notice that instant grief, shock, and confusion.
There are many personae in the tale, but the author supplied minor details about them. As the narration progresses, suddenly, you'll see a new character with little or no information about them. The focal characters, Lilly and Sasha, are not left out. I only saw few details about their personality, background, and physical characteristics. Hence, I couldn't connect to them and the rest of the personae.
Furthermore, the book is not formatted; there are no chapters and scene breaks. The dialogues are not enclosed in quotation marks. Although some new authors write in this manner, it was difficult for me to follow the story. Sometimes, I couldn't determine whether a particular statement was a reported speech or part of the author's description. While reading, I found some grammatical and typographical errors, such as "Sasha looked at him with no words coming out if his mouth" and "eight-moths-old baby." Included in the narration are some graphic rape scenes.
In conclusion, I rate this narrative 1 out of 4 stars. I couldn't rate it higher because of the above-mentioned flaws, and I can't recommend it for anyone now. It lacks integrity and thus, shouldn't be set in a bookstore until the author revises it.
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Lilly?
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