POVs have been released. Thoughts?
i'm unsurprised but,,, kind of disappointed? i expected phoebe and nate as narrators bc phoebe had the most going on by the end of oouin, and karen has repeatedly said nate is her favorite.
i wasn't expecting maeve because her narration has always seemed the weakest in oouin (i've noticed that karen's strong narrations in the oou world are always comparable to some other narrator in one of her stand-alones, but i've never had a perfect maeve comparison).
since nate is a narrator, i didn't expect to have bronwyn, especially since the rojas sisters have been narrating for two books in a row. also it doesn't make sense to have someone who doesn't live in bayview anymore narrate.
knox and nate are too similar. you can't have both.
coop is in the same boat as bronwyn — he's too far removed from bayview now. same argument for kris bc he lives in san diego and he really is a minor character.
addy is unsurprising. if there's an important character, they'll have a connection to her. the only other pov character i can think of who shares that trait is maeve. addy is the sister-in-law of knox's employer. she's phoebe's neighbor. she's besties with the b4 and their partners (partners being kris lol). she's friends with maeve, and she works with luis. ads just makes sense (plus the mystery is def going to revolve around her but that's for my next post).
but what i'm really disappointed about is luis. only two characters have had direct influence in both mysteries, and it's maeve and luis. the rojas sisters have had their moment in the sun (and honestly i'd be upset if it was extended) but luis has been there since day one. he got the license plate numbers, he stood up for coop, he got the video for knox. those things feel small but they had really important repercussions. i guess it's just annoying to see luis as a plot device for two books but then not get recognition.
also, luis is connected to everyone too. he's best friends with cooper and addy and kris. he works with phoebe and he seems friendly with knox (plus he's dating knox's ex). he's dating bronwyn's sister, and nate is his girlfriend's brother in every way but blood relation. plus if it really is jake who's back (see more in next post) then we need his narration. the story won't feel complete without it.
plus it kind of feels like karen has toyed with the idea of a luis narration because mateo and jonah sound a lot like luis would if he had a narration. it's really disappointing not to have him as a narrator.
and in terms of relationships, i feel like maybe cooper/kris and maeve/luis will be sidelined just because of the narrators. natewyn isn't going anywhere, they are the couple of the oou world. and phoebe and knox have a lot of development in their future. coop/kris and maeve/luis are just going to be on the sideline which is disappointing bc we haven't had a lot of cooper/kris and maeve/luis are just starting to date and there's a lot of stuff like trust issues to get through before they're stable.
