A Study In Drowning (Daily React)

A Study In Drowning by Ava Reid

Ava Reid

Author

1.18.2025

Effy Is Insufferable

Chapters 1 thru 5

Many of the audiobooks I listen to are not for me. I am well aware of that. I try different books based on who is READING THEM and not who is WRITING them or what they are ABOUT. I don’t usually care about plot because

1. I have aphantasia and things don’t always register well in my mind and

2. I have a broken memory thanks to PTSD and chronic pain so I don’t remember experiences past a few weeks anyway.

I listen to audiobooks to help me fall asleep where chronic pain, tinnitus, anxiety, racing thoughts, and other issues would make it impossible for me to fall asleep. They are therapeutic more than they are entertainment. What makes them entertainment is a really good narrator who helps bring the story to life for me in a way that words on a page cannot.

I reiterate this to say that I’m well aware that I’m not always choosing books that are going to appeal to me … and in some ways I think that makes me very different from other readers who ONLY read what appeals to them genre wise. Narrator and an interesting title are sometimes the ONLY reasons I choose a book.

Sometimes I find something wonderful … and sometimes I find something … difficult. Sometimes I find something I absolutely cannot stop listening to and I lose tons of sleep and look forward to diving back in every night … and sometimes I find something that I have to turn off almost immediately. Sometimes I find something I know isn’t written for someone like me but that I find wonder and uniqueness in … and sometimes I find something that normally I would absolutely never think to pick up if I knew what it was and realize it’s kind of interesting.

I love the adventure of being open to things. I have said many times before that discovering that I don’t like something is just as thrilling as discovering that I love something. It’s an exploration of who I am and I’m constantly discovering new things about myself. I think many people need to do more of this for themselves.

All that said … A Study In Drowning is difficult and the main heroine is absolutely insufferable. The feeling she swirls up in me every time I hear her speak or hear her thoughts makes my skin crawl, my eyes roll, and makes me want to turn the book off. It COULD be because with audiobooks the narrator is giving the character a voice and a personality that is an interpretation … and it’s the “sound” of the character I can’t stand … but it is also how the author has written her. It is her personality, her choices, her irrationality, her unnecessary anger, her absolute cluelessness, her inability to understand anything including herself, her weakness, her lack of intelligence … EVERYTHING about her turns me off and turns my stomach. The sad thing is … I don’t think at all that she is supposed to.

I think she’s supposed to be a compelling character and someone you feel sorry for and someone who you root for. I think she’s supposed to be someone you empathize with and someone who you can understand.

She’s beyond my understanding … but so are A LOT of people. She’s someone who makes decisions and has thoughts that are so far outside of logic that I can’t really wrap my mind around it. She’s someone so emotionally dysregulated that she seems dangerous and frankly unhinged. This is probably normal for most people but it’s really so far from me that I just don’t get it and absolutely cannot relate to it in any way.

This is a ME issue. I know that. I’m not faulting the book. This book IS NOT for me. It’s not written for someone like me. It’s really beyond me. Trust me … I KNOW THAT. I ALWAYS know that. I’m a Black, neurodivergent, stoic synesthete with aphantasia … trust me when I say there are no books written that I can relate to or world that I fit into or characters that I feel akin to.

The book has nothing but glowing reviews and it’s a bestseller and Ava Reid is some kind of genius author who writes tons of books now (this is her debut novel) and anyone who doesn’t recognize that is some kind of broken thing with bad taste in books. Yeah yeah … media is subjective and I have never cared about what other people like or what other people think is good or what other people recommend … I am ME and my taste and interests are about ME and ME only.

All I’m saying is … FOR ME … this book is rough to experience and Effy is someone who I would walk very quickly away from if I ever met her. She’s not well for a variety of reasons, none of which are her fault … but she’s too dysregulated for me. I know this is a YA book and it appeals to people who are similar to her … and that is NOT me.

Effy reminds me of all the emotionally dysregulated fans of television shows and movies and books that kind of live in their heads and fantasies all the time and don’t know how to function in the real world. These are people who get angry enough to send actors death threats and have parasocial relationships with characters they ship. These are people who just don’t seem to have any clue to how differentiate real from fantasy and use media as therapy instead of getting the real help they need for the psychological and emotional imbalances they have. These are people who hurt themselves and hurt others.

Here’s the thing though …

Ava has created such a FASCINATING world that seems equally dysregulated and equally uncomfortable. I’m not quite sure what it is … it’s a world that feels cobbled together out of ideas that don’t quite come together. It feels like she threw a bunch of thoughts into a bowl and spilled them out and said … THIS. It’s not orderly. It’s unnerving. It seems underdeveloped while also feeling like it’s exactly what she intended. And THAT is kind of fascinating. It takes place kind of … nowhere except in her own mind and I feel like she’s trying to communicate that space in a way that will never become clear … but for someone with aphantasia it feels very much comfortable for me to only have a vague idea of something. I’m comfortable in Ava’s world … because it feels formless yet it has intention. It’s here, it’s there, it’s this time period, it’s another time period … it’s just … whatever. I love the world she’s created and I love even more that it makes no sense and all the sense too.

I like how it doesn’t hold your hand and drops you into a world that she has already formed solidly in her mind and its up to you to catch up. I like that it has a HISTORY that you can never know fully and that’s just enough for it to feel … real. I like that it feels like I walked into book 3 of something instead of book 1 of something … you know what I mean? I feel like I’m missing something but I’m not. It’s giving as intended.

Gothic mystery tends to either work or flop … there is no in-between … and I feel so drawn to the world Ava has made and so fascinated by this impending sense of … DROWNING. I felt like I was drowning the whole time I was listening both in a way that is probably intended and a way that feels tedious and AWFUL … which might be also as intended.

I did have to turn it off because Effy was annoying me. Everything about her was making me so irritated but I am interested in the STORY. I am interested in the WORLD. I just am not interested in her AT ALL and don’t want to have to navigate this wonderful, strange place with her as my guide.

What I need to do is set aside how the character makes me feel and focus on empathizing with HER experience and what the author WANTS me to feel instead of what I would naturally feel. That is a difficult place to get to but that is the best way to experience ART and media. It’s not about YOU. It’s about Ava Reid’s world and vision and the gift she is giving to you. Take yourself OUT of media … and put yourself into the ART as it’s intended.

I will try again tomorrow night … I really want to experience the mystery Ava has created.

Story this session: 3.0 out of 5.0 stars
Narration: 5.0 out of 5.0 stars

Current Review

Subject to change as I continue to experience the book …

A Study In Drowning by Ava Reid
A Study In Drowning (Daily React)
Sound Quality
Narration (Emotion)
Narration (Characters)
Narration (Line Reads)
Writing (Plot)
Writing (World)
Writing (Characters)
Standouts! 🥰
Ava's world is ... frankly kind of amazing and a mess and giving as intended.
I love the feeling of DEEP history without using tons of exposition.
Disliked 😒
The main character is absolutely insufferable but that's a ME problem.
4.3
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