Joint Review : Dirty Red by Tarryn Fisher

book: Dirty Red
author: Tarryn Fisher
file type: ebook

synopsis:

Dear Opportunist, 

You thought you could take him from me, but you lost. Now, that he's mine I'll do anything to keep him. Do you doubt me? I have everything that was supposed to be yours. In case you were wondering; he doesn't ever think about you anymore. I won't let him go....ever.

Dirty Red.

note: This year seems to just get better and better and BETTER. 2012 brought Zemira her diploma and brought me my much-awaited Kindle. (Claps madly).This year was also the year we got to be better friends and could come and work on YA Fanatic together. This year we were also introduced to a groundbreaking , earth shattering , eye-weeping , heartbreaking etc. etc. book which blew us away with it's epicness. This book was none other The Opportunist by Tarryn Fisher. Here are our reviews , if you wish to know about how crazy we actually are about this awesomeness.
Devyani's review:HERE. and Zemira's review:HERE.

So here's a quick recap.

WARNING: If you haven't read the previous book....then you're an idiot and we hugely recommend it to you. Imagine yourself being thrown towards the book. So if you haven't then you probably shouldn't go ahead and read further.  Read our reviews in the link given and then proceed.For the others..let's begin , shall we? :D

Quick Recap :

There is a girl. There is a guy. They love each other. But both of them are asses who ruin stuff and so they are forced apart. Then this guy meets another girl. But he still loves the previous one so he fakes an accident and fakes that he has amnesia and goes back to the girl but the girl doesn't  know that so she acts like she doesn't know about his amnesia and becomes his friend. But hey , remember the guy already has a girl? The new girl? who came after the previous lady love? Well brace yourself people because she's the real deal. She's the bitch. She is horrible and the evil villain who would do anything and everything to take what is hers.In the end, the evil chick does end up with the guy but the story isn't over yet...
Leah (the evil girl) , now married and pregnant has everything she wants. How far will she go to keep it?

Here's what Zemira has to say: 

Oh, Leah, Leah. You never learn from your mistakes. Even though she is the biggest bitch I’ve ever come across in a book, I admire her for one thing-she never gives up. I’m not sure if it’s the right thing considering she will never let go of Caleb even though he was never her to begin with. She even starts questioning it in the end but it’s already too late and the only thing she comes up with is to hurt Caleb even more.

All of her problems come from her childhood. She never really experienced love from her adoptive parents and she was always second best. But that doesn’t give her an excuse to act like a mental patient and scheme all the time. I am not a baby person and still I was shocked when she was jealous of the attention Caleb was giving to their newborn. She only wanted him for herself. Tarryn mentioned a couple of times that most of the people in these books are crazy in love, their love is addictive and they end up obsessed.

There was this soap opera my mum used to watch when I was a kid and the female antagonist does these horrible things to the ‘perfect’ couple but in in the finale she ends up buried in a coffin after she hides in it while on the run from the law. This is the sort of future I see for Leah. She should focus on her little girl, Estella rather than trying to ruin Caleb’s life.

I just hope there will a happy ending (read-Caleb & Olivia ending together). It doesn’t have to be the conventional HEA, I just need something that will satisfy all of these feeling I have towards these mind-blowing books. 

Here's what Devyani has to say:

The Opportunist had done a real number on me. It made me cry , laugh , swoon and die a little inside. If somebody asked me to elaborate on how much I loved this book , then all that person would get would be pure nonsensical incoherent babble.
Olivia's and Caleb's story was an unforgettable one. It ended in a very , well.. oxymoronic way. It was the right thing but it just pretty much shattered each and every ounce of hope I had in me. It was good yet it was bad and it hurt like a bitch.

Now here's Dirty Red. - A book from the point of view of a villain.

Leah Drake. Beautiful. Wealthy. Bitchy. the perfect opponent to the opportunist.

Shady and intelligent  to the core..if I had been the director of Mean Girls (the movie) then I would have given this book to Ms. Rachel McAdams for preparing herself into a bitchy character because there is nobody in this whole wide world who could be as evil as Leah.

I have to be honest , when I went into this book , I expected lot's of snark and shadiness. I expected to get to know the real Leah. I expected  to know how and why Leah became and is the way she is. And ......I got what I expected. But instead of making me happy , it just twisted me further.

I actually believed that after reading this book , I would start to like Leah.   Maybe even love her.I was expecting the same earth shattering and ground breaking and ratatataatat experience. I was hoping for the similar flow of emotions....but alas there wasn't any.

Now that I've vented out everything here's my conclusion in the end.

I am so happy with the way things turned out.

You read a book from the POV of a villain and you expect gooeyness? NONSENSE.
This is the brain of an evil person. You get to see evil things. Sure , you won't like it but are you supposed to like evil things?
What's the fun in falling in love with the villain?
What good would a villain be if her villainy substance evaporates into thin air?

Sure I wasn't crying of unhappiness but my scowl and irritation and frustration with this book made up for it. Would Mean Girls be Mean Girls without Rachel McAdams being mean?
So do you get my point?

But was this book as good as it's predecessor? No.

But writing a book from the POV of a villain is never easy. To keep up the tempo is equally difficult. And for all that , kudos to Ms.Fisher. Her writing is marvelous and has great potential into turning out much much more. I love her writing and I hope that she keeps up with what she's doing because it damn well makes the world happy.
But I have issues with this book too.
As good as it is , it had it's flaws.
The biggest flaw being well..I could be pegged as being emotional here but well I have to say it.
There is this one part where Leah meets Noah and terms him as the sexy 'Ghandi' . yes , 'GHANDI'. Now I know that it was a spelling error and a mistake in editing. But I ignored it once , but this term was mentioned several times with the same wrong spelling.
I'm an Indian and the history of my country has hugely been influenced by this man. Mahatma Gandhi (yes, the correct spelling.) is the father of my nation and be it just a spelling error , I would get offended with such things. So , just a little note for the author , please in future try to take care of such tiny mistakes.
Other than that , well the issue of this book not being able to live up to it's predecessor would continue to be a factor.

But the beauty of this whole scenario is that this is just the second book.
It could be just my thinking or this could be what the author intended...but the way this book has been written it's so easy to see that it's just gearing you up for the next one which , my friends , is the book finale. The final showdown. It's okay if you didn't like this one but you're definitely going to be waiting for the next one aren't you?
Smart woman you are Ms.Fisher. You already had us in your bag , didn't you?
You were introduced to the opportunist and now you know the dirty red...now let's see what happens in Fisher's next venture.
So should you all read this book?

Is it even a question , hell yes.

Joint thought.

Leah sucks.

What we can't wait for.
The third book. And guess what it's from Caleb's POV!!!!!