Sneha Jaiswal's Blog, page 63

Jack & Joker Review: Deals a Few Fun Cards Before Losing the Plot

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Jack is a kind athlete turned debt-collector, whose dreams of living a simple life are dashed by a notorious thief named Joker, who robs a bank and the cops zero in on Jack as a primary suspect in the case due to misleading circumstances. The arrest changes their lives, Jack is forced to work for a loan-shark, while Joker lands in prison. Thus begins an “enemies to lovers” tale between the debt-collector and the expert thief.

Directed by Tee Bundit Sintanaparadee (“I Feel You Linger In The Air”/“Step by Step”/”TharnType”), the 2024 Thai series “Jack & Joker: U Steal My Heart!” stars Yin Anan Wong and War Wanarat Ratsameerat as titular protagonists Jack and Joker respectively. Spanning 12 episodes, the show begins with a dramatic bank heist, which is preceded by a disclaimer that essentially tells the viewers – “we know this isn’t possible in real life, just go along with it”. The honesty was refreshing, and it was the creators’ way of saying this show is pure entertainment.

The first few episodes of Jack & Joker are fun, with the pilot introducing Joker as a bright young man who, mistreated by his father, turns to a life of crime for thrills. On the day Joker plans a big bank heist, athlete Jack visits the same bank to apply for a loan to start a learning center. Disguised as a bank manager, Joker approves the loan but later surrenders himself to clear Jack of suspicion after the robbery—though Jack never learns this. Years later, Joker, fresh out of prison, is shocked to find Jack, once a kind-hearted dreamer, now a feared debt collector working for the ruthless Boss (Beam Sarunyoo Prachakit). Hoping to make amends, Joker teams up with thugs Tattoo (Prom Ratchapat Worrasarn) and Hoy (Bonz Nadol Lamprasert) to steal a ring belonging to Jack, now held by Boss as collateral, hoping it would set Jack free. Their mission sets off a series of chaotic events, ultimately bringing Jack and Joker closer together.

The first few episodes were definitely fun, and I found myself looking forward to catching up with the series every Monday. Fans of Yin Anan Wong and War Wanarat Ratsameerat from the college drama Love Mechanics already know their onscreen chemistry is fantastic. That remains true in Jack & Joker as well, but unfortunately, the romantic subplot is quite thin, leaving their dynamic underexplored. There’s a generous amount of action across the episodes, although a lot of the sequences are poorly choreographed. On top of that, the comedic material becomes less effective as the series progresses, and the plot spirals into chaos. For example, a major subplot involves a wealthy heiress who is in love with Jack. At one point, Jack’s character is briefly reduced to an object of negotiation, as the heiress strikes a deal with Boss over a theft orchestrated by Joker—her end of the deal being to ensure Jack agrees to date or marry her.

While both Yin and War are entertaining in their roles, the plot is overstretched and this show should’ve only been about eight episodes long. Apart from the lead actors, the one character that stood out best in “Jack & Joker” was Mark Siwat Jumlongkul as Aran, the flamboyant, self-obsessed son of Boss. Mark brings a lot of sass and hilarity to Aran’s personality, and manages to make the stereotypical rich brat character somewhat likable in the show.

Overall, there was a lot of potential wasted in this show, if they wanted to make like a heist-parody series, they should’ve hired better comedy writers.

Rating: 5 on 10. Jack & Joker is available on iQIYI.

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In Utero: Graphic Novel Review

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Imagine being a near-teen yet wanting to accompany your mom to her workplace instead of attending a holiday camp in an abandoned shopping mall. The camp must suck real bad. That’s the case with 12-year-old Hailey, who is one of the oldest kids at her oddly located camp. With nobody interesting her age, she sneaks out of the center, meeting Jen, a mysterious, curious, bespectacled teenager who befriends Hailey. Almost immediately, Hailey starts telling Jen random facts, while the older girl begins to talk about her own bizarre origins.

In Utero by Chris Gooch is a weirdly hypnotic sci-fi tale that starts with an unexplained explosion, the smoke plumes filling the sky, as a pregnant woman and her son watch the horror unfold. The woman is eventually revealed to be protagonist Hailey’s mother. Twelve years later, Hailey’s fateful meeting with Jen, a supernatural being who assumes human form, leads the girl to dark corners of the abandoned mall, full of scary secrets and a possible explanation to the explosion all those years ago. As a terrifying creature begins to rise, Hailey is caught in a violent face-off between the military and the “monsters.”

The artwork by Chris Gooch is slightly retro in tone, very expressive and immersive, immediately pulling the viewer into its strange sci-fi world. The color scheme for the graphic novel is largely black and blue, while a few pages also feature shades of red. Chris Gooch sparingly but cleverly uses red and peachy tones in selective scenes, where the red highlights the mood of the moment. For instance, the first time we see the color red is in a panel where police cars and fire trucks rush to control a fire.

Hailey is short, plump, with inquisitive eyes, while Jen is taller, nerdy-looking, with a “know-it-all” kind of face, like she could be the next big tech billionaire. As the story progresses, we learn Jen is also a transcendental being who can take any shape and travel anywhere. She gives Hailey a trip to her birthplace—a giant egg—hence the title In Utero. The plot interestingly brings out the differences between the friendly curiosity of children and the hostile cynicism of adults. When the kids find creepy creatures in the mall, they are excited to interact with them, play with them, while the first instinct of an adult is to throw up.

Overall, Chris Gooch’s artwork is the biggest highlight of In Utero, while the story could’ve used a longer gestation period and more development. Ultimately, even though it seems to be a “man versus monster” tale, it’s really a story about how one friendly conversation is enough to forge a strong bond between two beings from vastly different worlds.

Rating: 3.5/5. In Utero is also on Kindle Unlimited.

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Sikandar Ka Muqaddar Review: A Heist of Time, Not Entertainment

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Ah, a heist movie, where the suspense is over who the real thief is. There are only three suspects, so the list is narrow, and the real question is “how did they pull it off?”—the “who” is pretty secondary. Unfortunately, the 2024 Sikander Ka Muqaddar is such a slow-burn, sleep-inducing movie that if I had known beforehand how inconsequential most of the middle half was going to be, I would’ve just skipped to the end to find out the “who” and “how.” The “who” was always predictable, but the “how” is even more disappointing. At least the makers manage to keep viewers interested in finding out the truth until the very end, so points for that.

Directed by Neeraj K Pandey, who co-wrote the story with Vipul K. Rawal, Sikander Ka Muqaddar stars Avinash Tiwary (Madgaon Express/Khakee: The Bihar Chapter) as Sikander, the primary suspect in a diamond heist, while Jimmy Shergill plays Jaswinder, the tough cop hellbent on cracking the case. The only two other suspects in the theft are Kamini Singh (Tamannah Bhatia) and Mangesh Desai (Rajeev Mehta), two colleagues who were in charge of the stall where the gems went missing at a jewelry expo.

Sikander Ka Muqaddar begins on an interesting note: the cops are alerted about a heist attempt by armed gunmen, and even though the gunmen are quickly neutralized, gems worth crores go missing from a stall. Instead of diving straight into the suspects and investigation, the story skips 15 years into the future, where star investigator Jaswinder is now a washed-up, drunk officer on the verge of being fired, while Sikander, the primary suspect, appears to be living a cushy life in Abu Dhabi. Flitting between the past and present, the movie explores the hardships faced by Sikander, Mangesh, and Kamini, the three suspects. However, the maximum spotlight is on Avinash Tiwary and Tamannah Bhatia’s characters, making it clear that either one of them is the thief—or perhaps a surprise ending will introduce an unexpected twist to the plot.

Jimmy Shergill as the obstinate cop determined to catch his thief (very similar to his cop character in Phir Aayi Hasseen Dillruba) is the only interesting personality in the story. And for a movie with a 2-hour 22-minute runtime, Sikander Ka Muqaddar is quite the drag, focusing heavily on Sikander’s domestic life and the many obstacles he faces due to the taint of being the primary accused in a major case. A minor romantic subplot between Sikander and Kamini lacks spark, with negligible onscreen chemistry. Like most of the film, everything feels rather “constructed.” Maybe this would’ve been a lot more entertaining if it had come out in the 1990s, when viewers weren’t spoiled for choice with endless options on TV. But for a 2024 release, this film was quite the downer.

It did lead to an exciting climax, and for a moment, I thought, “Oh, maybe this is going to be satisfying after all!” However, the creators chose to close the story with an open-ended cliffhanger and a cheeky text on screen that reads: “Oops! The End.”

Oh well… Oops! Don’t think viewers will find that as amusing as the makers intended it to be.

Rating: 5/10. Watch the film on Netflix.

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Everyone in my Family Has Killed Someone: Book Review

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

This murder mystery was a solid 4-star read until the climactic chapters rolled in, revealing the killer’s identity! It was like enjoying a fantastic three-course meal, only to be hit with a stale, sour dessert at the end. Also, for those who don’t like the narrator breaking the fourth wall and addressing the reader (like Deadpool or Fleabag), this could be annoying. I’m ambivalent about this literary device; sometimes I enjoy it (in this case, I did), in other cases—not so much.

The Cunningham family is quite colorful, and some members are more evidently murderers than others. Take protagonist Ernest’s elder brother Michael, for instance, who goes to jail for murdering a man. In fact, it’s his release date that prompts the family reunion at the snowy hotel. Audrey, their mother, is the family matriarch. She is upset with Ernest for testifying against Michael and is married to their shrewd stepdad, lawyer Marcelo. Since Michael’s history of murder is clearly established in the first chapter of the novel, he becomes one of the strongest suspects.

Benjamin Stevenson starts off the novel by listing Ronald Knox’s 10 Commandments of Detective Fiction, where rule number is pretty clear – The criminal must be someone mentioned in the early part of the story, but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader has been allowed to follow. Ernest, the narrator promises to stick to Knox’s rules and swears he isn’t going to be the murderer, since we’re allowed to follow his thoughts. Ernest like his name, does try to not mislead us, and Benjamin’s easy, mildly humorous writing style makes this a novel a largely breezy read. That is, until we finally know who the killer is!

The revelation was unexpected, it definitely catches the reader (or at least me) off-guard, but it doesn’t hit the way a fantastic murder mystery would. Let’s call the killer Nat – short for either Natalie or Nathaniel, there are no characters by those names, it’s just to keep things gender neutral and spoiler-free. Now, like all good murder mysteries, author Benjamin Stevenson makes the reader suspicious of almost everybody in “Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone”, including Nat. But nobody’s motive is crystal clear until the very end, so when the big reveal about the murderer happens, despite a lot of new information and story twists, Nat’s motivation doesn’t feel satisfactory. It doesn’t give you the ‘aha!’ kind of satisfaction.

But of-course, some readers might not mind the ending and this could still end up being a 4 or even a 5 star read for you! One of the best bits about reading “Everyone in my Family Has Killed Someone” was how easily I could visualize the stories and characters, in-fact, I kept thinking of how actor Timothy Simons (Veep/Nobody Wants This) would be perfect to play Michael, Ernest’s brother, if this novel gets a live-action adaptation.

My rating? 3 on 5 stars.

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A Balloon’s Landing Review: Visuals Soar, Plot Runs Aground

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

“In 2003, Leslie Cheung passed away, so did my parents…“

Gotta love how Taiwanese film “A Balloon’s Landing” (original title: Wo zai zhe li deng ni) pays an ode to acting legend and queer icon Leslie Cheung. That said, the 2024 romance directed by Angel Ihan Teng, falls pretty short in terms of storytelling & execution, despite stunning cinematography, and charming lead actors.

The plot follows popular Hong Kong author Gu Tian Yu (Terrance Lau) who is mired in controversy due to plagiarism accusations by another writer. Overwhelmed by feelings of loneliness, hopelessness, and despair, Tian Yu plans on making a trip to Taiwan, to find the ‘bay of whales’, that a pen-friend used to write to him about. In Taiwan, Tian Yu runs into small-time thug Jin Run Fa (Fandy Fan), who promises to take him to the ‘bay of whales’. Unsure if the goon really knows the place or is simply trying to fleece him, Tian Yu lets the cheery Run Fa becomes his guide, and the two travel together over days, bonding unexpectedly over little misadventures and fights.

While the first half of A Balloon’s Landing is intriguing and entertaining, its slow-burn pace keeps you wondering if it really is a romance movie. The answer is: not really. It delves more into themes of friendship, and that’s what it really should’ve been about—two men bonding on a platonic level—because the romance is extremely thin. The successful author Tian Yu and poor thug Jin Run Fa work better as two men from clashing worlds, sharing a bumpy road trip together. There’s also unexpected magical realism in the tale and a heartwarming subplot about how Tian Yu communicates through letters with a young boy. It’s these letters that help him through difficult phases of his life. For the young boy, too, Tian Yu’s letters are a lifeline, a source of hope and inspiration. How their paths cross unexpectedly is very contrived in the movie.

Unlike the Taiwanese romantic movie , where a lot of angst, despair, and tragedy experienced by its lead male pair was justified, “A Balloon’s Landing” feels unnecessarily tragic. It’s also needlessly cryptic about the sexuality of its protagonists, rarely giving us honest emotional moments between the leads. For most of its runtime, it plays out as a joyous road-trip story, only to throw in a violent twist that feels forced and manipulative rather than natural. Fortunately, the magical-realism element saves the climax, offering an intriguing twist that leaves Tian Yu and Jin Run Fa’s story open-ended. Still, by the end, I couldn’t help but feel cheated—this wasn’t the dramatic romance the trailer had promised. The film squanders its magical potential to deliver a memorable love story, though its visual appeal might make it worth a one-time watch.

Rating: 5 on 10. You can watch “A Balloon’s Landing” on Netflix.

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Dan Da Dan Episode 9 Review: Teens Vs Aliens

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The creepy aliens are back—the Serpoians—and this time, they want Okarun’s ‘banana.’ Episode 8 of Dan Da Dan ends with the aliens stripping Okarun naked, and just as they were about to rip him apart, Aira transforms into Acrobatic Silky and rushes to his rescue!

Titled “Merge! Serpo Dover Demon Nessie!”, episode nine focuses on Okarun, Aira, and Momo teaming up to fight the Serpoians, who turn their school into an alternate spiritual dimension that can only be entered by powerful beings. But remember how Momo misunderstands that Okarun and Aira were making out on campus? Well, while fighting the aliens, there’s a lot of funny bickering between the three of them due to teen jealousies.

Episode nine feels like it takes a page out of Osamu Tezuka’s manga creations; it’s very sexually charged, but all of it is mixed with hilarity. To fight off the aliens, Momo and Aira ride Okarun like how Momo rode Okarun to attack Turbo Granny in episode 4 of Dan Da Dan, but the difference is—this time, Okarun is butt naked. And c’mon, you know how that sentence sounds, so imagine what it looks like, L-O-L.

The pace, animation, and music in this episode are fast and entertaining, but some of the combat sequences fall a little flat. The aliens hire a “gig worker,” or as they literally call it, a “gigu warka” (said with a Japanese accent), who kinda looks like a giant mantis and tries to pulverize the teen trio. The face-off starts with a burnt-orange tint for the first few minutes, but the second half shifts to green tones—a perfect choice to match both the mantis-like enemy and the bizarre, manipulated matrix dimension they’re trapped in.

I definitely think the previous episode was more fun, but “Merge! Serpo Dover Demon Nessie!” still ends with a wild, hilarious cliffhanger and is sure to get some big laughs from viewers willing to ride the manga madness!

You can stream ‘Dan Da Dan’ on Netflix and CrunchyRoll.

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Lucky Baskhar Review: Banks on Dulquer Salmaan But Story Arc Doesn’t Cash In

Rating: 2 out of 5.

“If I win and then lose, I’ll only remember the loss. If I lose and then win, the victory remains in history. Because history only remembers how you finished. I don’t know how will history remember me. How will you remember me?”

This is the closing quote of the 2024 movie Lucky Bhaskar, starring Dulquer Salmaan as the titular protagonist, a struggling bank employee who embezzles his way into a fabulous life of wealth. Now, history is too vast a subject, but for an almost 3-hour-long film, it’s easy to remember how it begins, no matter how smart its ending might be. And for the first full hour, director and writer Venky Atluri (Vaathi/Rang De) fumbles at establishing Bhaskar as a likable protagonist.

Bhaskar is shown to be a hardworking, middle-class bank employee, knee-deep in debt because he is the sole breadwinner in a family consisting of an ailing father, two younger siblings who are college students, a homemaker wife (Meenaakshi Chaudhary), and a school-going child. But the year is 1989, Bhaskar lives in Mumbai in a house of his own, and he rides a scooter to work—two big luxuries for the time, and certainly not “borderline poverty” like Bhaskar claims at the beginning of the tale. I mean, c’mon! He doesn’t have to pay rent in Mumbai and has a bank job! The house is so big, one entire family could live in his hall and pay him rent. It seems more like a classic case of financial mismanagement.

Not sure why nobody else in Bhaskar’s family is chipping in. The college-going siblings could tutor kids in the evenings, and his educated wife, who harps on about wanting to start a home-food business, never actually gets a job to help out. Add to that, Bhaskar pins all his hopes on a promotion, and when that doesn’t happen, he picks a fight with his senior at work, only to immediately shut up when the senior points out that Bhaskar has a side hustle, which is illegal. Most of this is established in the very first ten minutes, by the way. Venky Atluri tries to paint Bhaskar as a pity-worthy, middle-class man pushed by hardships into a life of bank fraud to make quick cash. Why not just show him as he is—an opportunistic wolf in sheep’s clothing, living beyond his means?

At the beginning of Lucky Bhaskar, there’s a disclaimer that says, “Although the entire story takes place in Mumbai, all the characters speak in Telugu for the convenience of the Telugu audience.” They should’ve just added, “P.S. We don’t know much about Mumbai. He He.” The entire movie rests on Dulquer Salmaan’s shoulders, so the entertainment value of the film depends on how onboard you are with Bhaskar’s backstory of financial woes. I patiently slogged through the entire film to see if Bhaskar faces the music for his misdemeanors at some point. No such luck.

The second half of Lucky Bhaskar tries to pull a Wolf of Wall Street, with Bhaskar becoming a millionaire through market manipulation of stocks. Things do get interesting for about 30–40 minutes in between. As he keeps getting richer and greedier, he faces some minor setbacks in his personal life and conveniently learns a tough lesson through someone else’s misery. This could’ve been a highly entertaining movie if only director Venky Atluri had taken the risk to show his protagonist as a more aggressively morally gray character, instead of throwing in sentimental scenes to make viewers feel bad for him. Like a scene where Bhaskar and his family walk out of a birthday party because his sister-in-law begrudges his son an extra piece of cake, telling the kid, “This is enough for your face” (lol, wut?).

How will we remember Bhaskar? As the guy who had his cake and ate it too. Watch the film if you’re a Dulquer Salman fan.

Rating: 2 stars on 5. “Lucky Bhaskar” is on Netflix.

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Janitor 988 Short Film Review

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“Janitor 988” is an incredibly short film—under four minutes—and it popped up on my home feed, courtesy of the YouTube algorithm gods. As soon as the film began, with a scene of an unnamed janitor cleaning an office floor after hours as the only person left at work, my mind immediately went to those viral LinkedIn posts about janitors. You’ve probably seen them too—the ones quoting, “You should treat the janitor the same way you treat the CEO.”

While watching Janitor 988, I couldn’t help but think about how janitors are often invisible in workplace settings, rarely noticed, and sometimes completely isolated from the rest of the staff. This is certainly the case for the janitor in the film, who oscillates between despair, fleeting joy, and emptiness as he moves through a deserted office. His loneliness during work hours becomes a metaphor for the social isolation many people face in life. That’s the core theme of the film, as hinted at in the title: the protagonist lacks an identity beyond his employee number, ultimately reduced to a statistic after his passing.

For a film just four minutes long, Janitor 988 delivers a swift, ad-like production that might leave some viewers spiraling about what it means to feel invisible, unappreciated, and unheard. And of-course, here’s the thing about loneliness: it doesn’t care who you are. Janitor or CEO, it can hit anyone.

You can watch it now on YouTube. It’s also embedded below.

Cruel Intentions Review: Barely Bold, Mildly Entertaining

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Look, I’m sorry if you’re a big fan of the original 1999 movie Cruel Intentions, but I only saw it on TV much later, sometime in the mid-2000s… and aside from the salacious plot involving two incestuous step-siblings manipulating a sweet blonde girl played by Reese Witherspoon, I honestly don’t remember much about it. So, this review won’t make comparisons between the 2024 series and the movie, which BTW was based on the French novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos.

Plot overview: After a hazing incident at an elite college places student fraternities/sororities under scrutiny, Caroline (Sarah Catherine Hook), the President of ‘Delta Phi Phi,’ conspires with her step-sibling Lucien (Zac Burgess) to seduce Annie Grover (Savannah Lee Smith), the daughter of the U.S. Vice President, in a bid to maintain their power and influence on campus. A major sub-plot focuses on how Caroline orchestrates a sly coup to oust the Alpha-Gamma President with the help of her loyal sidekick CeCe Carroway (Sara Silva) and friend Blaise Powell (John Kim), paving the way for the dim-witted Scott Russell (Khobe Clarke) to take over.

Sarah Catherine Hook looks every bit the snooty, manipulative, and privileged Caroline, complete with “mommy issues” and a willingness to stoop to any level to get what she wants. But the character often feels robotic, kinda like M3GAN from the techno-horror movie, but with even less personality. Zac Burgess, on the other hand, doesn’t quite sell the role of the man-slut Lothario Lucien, who can’t seem to get it on without a camera. Sure, Zac Burgess is undeniably cute, but he feels more like the guy you’d cast as Troy Bolton in High School Musical—you know, the “sweet, cute, nice” type—rather than the suave hotshot who can seduce any woman he sets his sights on. And I suppose that’s one of the biggest casting misfires in “Cruel Intentions”. Savannah Lee Smith is gorgeous as Annie Grover, but her character is extremely one-dimensional and boring. So, the seduction and power-games in this series is just not strong.

It’s Sara Silva as CeCe Carroway, who is the most fun to watch in this eight-episode series, a high-functioning, anxious young woman, who is like a robotic minion to Caroline. However, despite CeCe always running around doing errands, she is a lot more human. She constantly works, ensures all sorority events are perfect, becomes TA to History Professor Chadwick (Sean Patrick Thomas), and juggles both roles with surprising ease. Khobe Clarke, who plays the “dumb” Scott Russell, is the next most amusing characters in “Cruel Intentions”. After suffering some brain damage in a hazing incident, he becomes the source of the show’s silliest conversations. For example: when an inspection committee auditing the fraternity says, “We just need to take a look at your records,” Scott earnestly replies, “Yeah, we just use Spotify.”

John Kim is pretty sharp as Scott’s manipulative best-friend and secret boyfriend represents the not so privileged members of the fraternity, having to try extra hard to keep his place in the elite clubs. Brooke Lena Johnson plays Beatrice Worth, an activist-style student who leads the anti-Greek movement on campus. She campaigns for the disbandment of the “classist” social clubs, accusing them of misusing college funds and perpetuating a system of discrimination and bullying. All the college clubs function like exclusive cults, with ridiculous activities, including crazy expensive costumed parties. And while ‘realism’ is the last thing on the creators’ mind, they really have enough comedy, or even satire infused in the script to keep you glued to the screen. Although, to be fair, I was engaged enough to watch all episodes in one go, but the pace wasn’t to my liking.

It’s all the side characters in the series that are a lot more interesting, and that’s not a good thing for a show that’s looking to be back for a season 2. Unless the other characters get more screen space if a next installment happens. And for a show heavily centered around sex as a key theme, “Cruel Intentions” is barely sexy, steamy, or racy. There’s little sexual tension between step-siblings Caroline and Lucien, and I can’t even say anything about the onscreen chemistry between other characters, because they simply do not have enough scenes together.

Overall, “Cruel Intentions” is a very good-looking series, courtesy a gorgeous cast, lavish sets, some beautiful sequences, however, it’s just not as bold, or saucy as one would want it to be. At least this is more entertaining than Prime Video’s “Maxton Hall”, another 2024 series which follows rich kids in an Elite school.

Rating: 5 on 10. Watch the series on Prime Video.

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Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing Book Review

Rating: 2 out of 5.

Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)

Between the 40% and 70% mark of this book, I thought about quitting Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing several times. But, much like this novel’s protagonist, who doesn’t like to leave things unfinished, I have a self-destructive habit of finishing any book I start, no matter how tedious it becomes. Thankfully, the climax is quite nice & open-ended, versus just how unreadable the novel becomes in between.

More than anything, this novel is about Cleo McDougal repeating the same points over and over again—the world is tough for women, being a single mother is extremely difficult, and she isn’t a very good person. Okay, yes, we get it, Cleo—men have it easy & motherhood is hard. You don’t need to say it 200 times! Author Allison Winn Scotch doesn’t stick to the basics of writing: “show, don’t tell.” Ironically, Cleo McDougal, a senator aspiring to run for President, seems to have things conveniently fall into place for her all the time, despite her constant whining. The ambitious Cleo, in-fact, is the biggest villain of her life, courtesy some calculated mean moves & poor decisions.

“Cleo McDougal is not a good person. She does good, yes, but doing good and being good aren’t the same thing, now, are they?” – opening lines of the Op-ed.

The plot is pretty simple and the novel does begin on an interesting note – Senator Cleo McDougal wakes up to find out she’s gone viral after her estranged childhood best-friend writes a nasty opinion piece stating “Cleo McDougal is not a good person”, while also insinuating that her son could be from an affair with a professor. Cleo and her team spring into damage control mode, worried that public opinion might jeopardize her chances of running for President. Acting on her political advisor Gaby’s suggestion, Cleo heads to her hometown to publicly apologize to a former friend MaryAnne —on camera, of course. Gaby also encourages her to tackle a list of 233 regrets (yep, she’s got them all written in a diary) as a way to show the world she’s a fallible, relatable human. I won’t write about what those regrets are, if you’re planning on reading the book, because well, they are the only interesting bits in the story. This book is all about Senator McDougal stumbling through her personal life in an attempt to score brownie points on her political journey.

Author Allison Winn Scotch’s writing style is simple and easy to follow, but the narration gets frustratingly repetitive. The protagonist, Cleo McDougal, isn’t exactly likable—whether it’s how she handles her professional affairs or how she deals with her teenage son, Lucas, a lot of her behavior screams “red flag.” For example, while snooping on her kid might be something many parents give in to, Cleo takes it further by jumping to serious accusations based on assumptions and hearsay instead of just talking to him like a reasonable adult. The other characters don’t get enough space in the book to form strong opinions about them.

For a self-made lawyer-turned-politician, Cleo has surprisingly little tact—it feels like you’re reading about a teenager running for school elections, not a 37-year-old, shrewd woman who lost her parents early, got pregnant while still in law school, and worked tirelessly to balance being a single mom and a driven law student. Or at least, the author rarely shows readers the more likable sides of her character. If things work out in the end for Cleo, it’s because the other people in her life aren’t as narcissistic as her, and surprisingly quite forgiving and helpful. Good for Cleo.

Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing has a fun start and an emotional ending, but left me feeling plenty of ‘regret’ as I slogged through its boring middle sections.

Rating: 2 on 5 stars. The novel is also on Kindle Unlimited.

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