This was a neutral read for me. It was predictable, and as another reviewer said, very tame. Some plot points didn't really make much sense to me or weren't expanded further on to enough of a degree for it to make sense. Some events felt like they were thrown in just for effect, like the author suddenly realised that not much was happening. Yet, I felt the quality of writing was actually quite good; as I could vividly imagine the movements of the characters and the scenes well. After hearing about the plot of this book on booktok though, I was expecting a lot more than it delivered.
How Brother was described to me, through a TikTok video I came across sharing horror reads, was that it tells the story through the eyes of Michael who was adopted/kidnapped into a family of murderers, who kills girls to eat them. Pretty wild concept, right?
Except, not a lot happens for the first half of the book. In fact, it is almost half way through that they actually kidnap and murder a woman. Even then, although it is mentioned, there was no real emphasis on the fact the family eat the victims. Also, Michael and Rebel talk frequently about having to bring home strawberry blonde girls for momma but not once do I remember momma explicitly requesting that they need to get another girl, say because they're running low on food. In fact, the mum and dad are very flat characters. I was expecting them to be very fleshed out brutal characters that murdered for the sadistic pleasure of it and ate the meat as a bonus, but they say and do very little. It is Rebel/Ray (I wish it was just Ray), Michael's brother that is the strongest character.
I assumed that the family were poor and that killing people was their way of simply feeding themselves, yet Reb drives a car (how does he pay for fuel?), the dad has a car and they live by woods and own guns, so they could hunt animals instead. You might be thinking, 'well they're just sadistic people and they kill for fun', but Reb seems to be the most unhinged. Like I said, momma never explicitly asks for them to kill for food, so I felt like this wasn't developed enough to where I could pinpoint their actual reason for killing women.
I still don't know the reasoning behind why -SPOILER- and what exactly that added to the story. It's stated by Michael that momma did it to protect him but that doesn't make any sense. Protect him from what exactly? Again, this felt like it was thrown in for effect, yet most of the characters are so flat that you'll have a hard time feeling sad for anyone that dies.
There was some allusion to momma just disliking having daughters, and also that she kills girls who look similar to her or her other daughter, because she wants to kill the anger inside of being abused as a child? This side of the story just didn't feel solidly developed and the mum was such a neutral character that I didn't care.
Michael is seen as the weakling of the family, very shy and pushed around by Rebel. He does what he's told because that all he's known, but also because he has a slight fear about what the family could do to him if he disobeys - fair enough. Except, Michael does something quite uncharacteristic when he was younger that turns out to be the catalyst to Rebel's final plan for Michael.
That leads me to the end of the book. As Reb's plan unfolds, Michael leaves the house to follow clues. The parents who are clearly in on Reb's plan, and would expect Michael to return in anger, go to bed? Surely, if they know that -SPOILER-, but they go to bed? It would have been a more satisfying ending if Michael actually confronted his parents; it would've given the parents a chance to show a little more of their thoughts on the whole thing.
Maybe I was wrong for believing a TikTok video that outlined the general plot of this book and expected too much, but reading other reviews tells me I'm not alone in my perception of this book. I'm surprised at those calling this a rollercoaster of a book, when to me, it felt like a kid friendly flat ride with the odd twisted surprise. It feels like the only people thinking this book is wild are those who mainly read romance and are just dipping their toe into the realm of "horror".
tangentwithtanner
jbbartram-illu
dailybridgerton
blakekathryn
titsay
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