#murder at homecoming spoilers

[cadybear420]

Cadybear's Reviews- Murder at Homecoming

Welcome to the thirty-seventh official Cadybear's Reviews! Today I'll be talking about Murder at Homecoming, which I have ranked on the "Platinum Tier" at 9 stars out of a possible 10. My last and only playthrough of this was during September-December 2022.

This is definitely one of the better, if not the best release, of 2022, and it’s easily among my personal faves. 

A MC who is proactive and gets shit done, multiple LIs, highly compelling story. How can I not love that? All three of the LIs are amazing characters– and Tyler especially is just precious. I think he’s the first love interest I have ever adored nearly as much as I’ve adored Aiden. I miss when we had male LIs that are just so babygirl. 

The incorporation of mature topics and queer themes was especially excellent. MTFL, take notes! Because THIS is how you write a teen story that talks about queer sexuality and mature behaviors. Besides maybe BiBound I mean BloodBound, this is probably the first book in Choices where each LI has some degree of confirmed sexuality outside of their LI option status for the MC. 

One thing that’s especially notable is how Tyler will talk about how he used to think he was straight if you romance him as a male or enby MC. I normally don’t mind much when LIs in GOC stories are made with the “playersexual” style of writing, but these sort of little changes are a good show of effort and give Tyler more character.

But of course, it’s not without a handful of problems. 

Like COP (1), the story is incredibly linear and none of the clues or choices really affect your story. Sure, they give you a bit of extra background, but that’s about it. 

The only choices that really have any impact are the stuff related to the queer discussions, Tyler’s romance route, and how the options for how your MC can talk about their queer experience can change based on your MC’s gender and romance choices. Which is still highly praiseworthy, don’t get me wrong, but I’d have loved to see some variation in the other elements of the book too.

And as much as I did enjoy this MC and do consider them one of the more refreshing ones, they were also a bit too rigid and pre-set for me at times. I get that some MCs will need to have pre-set details about them, and to some degree that does apply to this MC, but it was a bit much at times. Like, there was especially no need to give them a default first AND last name. I do like the aspect of MC preferring to go by their middle name, but we still could have been allowed to change their first and last names too, to be honest. 

I found it really hard to feel for the loss of Perdita for this reason; the traumatic event backstory didn’t feel as well established, compared to that of ILITW and ACOR MCs. Though to be fair, I do remember there being a handful of premium scenes to see a memory with Perdita, and I do remember skipping all but two of them. 

But even then, I never felt she had quite as much importance as the writers clearly wanted her to have? Outside of being a motivator for MC to solve Gabbie’s case and allowing MC to connect with Donovan better. Maybe my opinion on this might change after I give it a replay, though. 

That being said, I’m actually fine with the story not telling us what really happened to Perdita, as much as I’d have loved a continuation for this book. MC not knowing what happened to Perdita is what motivated them to solve Gabbie’s case, and in that regard, the two cases kind of juxtapose one another. Whereas MC is able to get closure for Gabbie’s case, they don’t do that for Perdita’s case.

That makes the ending a little more nuanced in my opinion. Sometimes, we don’t always get closure for these kinds of things. While I’m still mixed on how well the story integrated Perdita, this message was handled decently and didn’t feel like it was in bad spirit. 

So if there were a continuation for this story, I wouldn’t mind it being centered around MC finding Perdita, motivated to work on that case more actively after their success with Gabbie’s case. But rather than having them solve the case, it can mostly center around them struggling between whether they should keep up that search, or leave it as a cold case and move on. 

Overall, definitely a higher-tier and very respectable story that definitely deserves a replay. 

[leotheeworld]

Murder at homecoming.... Tyler being the jock with a heart of gold and no bullshit temper and Donovan making me a lofi playlist cause we went to his gig GOD. THIS IS REAL ROMANCE, FUCK YOU THE NANNY AFFLOP

[twyrinehaze]

sorry spoilers but not only was it the lamest possible choice w just the worst framing leading up to it

(the "oh shit" moment happened when it was revealed the drug was being used to treat epilepsy, but for some reason they insisted on dragging the reveal out 3 more chapters to the point where i thought i was genuinely wrong), but also aprils motivation doesnt make sense, and the writers even seem to know it doesnt make sense!! if shes doing it for brett why does she plainly show her disdain for brett like constantly, and if shes not doing it for brett, what the hell is she doing it for?? why gabbie and claudia? surely if shes implied to be vengeful and petty her more obvious target would be tyler who put her in the hospital?

and of course they could have avoided all the clumsy pitfalls if they just like. had the reveal of the drug be the "gotcha" moment it shouldve been. instead we get all of this feet dragging w joannas dad and claudia and her grandfather (which was just a straight up red herring, completely pointless) only to go around in a big circle back to the obvious, that april would have access to an epilepsy drug and was clearly there that evening! its almost like pb didnt even know that april was the killer, the way they just kind of like. stumble into it

and in a murder mystery story, it is kind of vital to the entire premise that you leave clues and foreshadowing throughout your story so your readers can piece things together as they go along. without that, the entire story just falls apart, and it all feels pointless! gabbies romance story was irrelevant, her secret criminal dealings were irrelevant, bretts assaults and drug abuse were irrelevant, and you wonder why you spent 14 chapters reaching a conclusion that really has no bearing on anything that came before it at all.

[a-bandonedships]

OMG THAT CHAPTER OF MAH! SOUND ON! SOUND ON!

[peonyblossom]

bruh 😒

chapter 1 and they already fucked up the pronouns

[killerpancakeburger]

Anyone else founds the plain dress prettier than the diamond dress? 😅 Never been into the 20s style...

[trystanposting]

whOAAAAA

[queenbirbs]

her name is Johanna and she is so pretty y’all 🥰

[mxnzies]

so outrageously funny that grace starts monologuing in dirty dudes must die and jason is just standing there like "wtf is wrong with you"

[mvalentine]

oh no im falling in love with another choices man 😭😭😭😭 when he makes you a playlist >>>>>

[masked-alien-lesbian]

I'm so angry these 2 didn't get their happy ever after. True they're very young, and it might not have lasted, but they'll never know now.

[cadybear420]

shitty last minute thing I made but I just had a realization

[leotheeworld]

Murder at Homecoming ended amazing. Got two end it off with Donavan and Tyler, MC processed their grief and moved on and everything felt like a proper send off. This was a good story for one book and tbh this is the one book I feel like PB didn't toss into disarray or make weird.

[twyrinehaze]

Referring back to your post, I think April’s reason for killing Gabbie is perfectly sound. Your points are logical and reasonable, but I understand April’s point of view in murdering Gabbie. For some people, family is everything. Even if we hate a family member or don’t care for them, there’s an “us vs. them” mindset at the end when they decide to justify their actions. The fact that Gabbie got Brett in jail, and then Claudia ended up being closer to Gabbie and distanced herself from April, those are the two main points why she decided to drug (and kill) Gabbie. Personally, those reasons are sound. I mean, of course they’re not valid reasons to murder someone, but April is just a psychopath and her reasonings make her think that her actions are valid.

when you choose to keep april talking she herself admits that she doesnt actually like brett and harbours a longstanding grudge towards him for taking the attention away from her in the family. personally i understand the "us vs them" mentality despite having family members with very deep flaws that i can resent sometimes, but if april really is just a deeply spiteful and cold person it doesnt track that she would stand up for brett in this way, who she sees as taking everything from her.

and if she really is so deeply spiteful in this way, i can think of a whole bunch of people her anger logically could encompass. the football team and tyler, who screwed her over and put her in the hospital? that never came to anything. brett himself, surely, would be a massive target for april? or, if we're still sticking w the idea that shes doing this for brett, even stevie would be a huge problem for her?

its not that i hate the entire idea of april as an antagonist, its that the prior pieces we get just dont add up to the complete full picture, which again, is kind of the most important part of making your murder mystery compelling. you cant just make your character "crazy" to justify all of their actions that dont fit.

[a-bandonedships]

SPOILER

LEVIIIIIIIIIIII 😩😱😍😭 Amazing cameo I miss the entire MOTY crew

[sporticus1234]

I find it wildly interesting how PB has 2 books circulating that deal with teacher-student relationships and yet the way they’ve written it and had the characters respond to it is VASTLY different.

In Murder at Homecoming, the characters were repulsed by idea of their teacher sleeping with a student, even though in the end, he was found to be innocent of it.

Meanwhile in Queen B, not only did the writers force the MC and the professor to interact every single damn chapter and gave the professor way more diamond scenes than Zoey to encourage the relationship, the relationship was encouraged by the MC’s best friend, who happened to be the other love interest getting the incredibly short end of the stick. 

Why did the writers see it as rightfully wrong and discouraged it in one case and did a complete 180 in another case? Why was it seen as repugnant and gross in Murder at Homecoming and seen as “true love” in Queen B?

 And because I know someone will, the setting being high school vs college shouldn’t be used to justify it. Any teacher sleeping with their student, regardless of if they are in high school or in college, is wrong. Period.