Customer Reviews

Butterfly

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I wanted to like this book so much. About 1/3 into the book I knew there was a problem with story development. This story takes way too much time building the back story. The story begins with Butterfly explaining her rise to fame with a reporter. Too much of the story was focused on Butterfly and an early relationship not related to her finally finding love. Also her relationship with her agent in the beginning was strange I could never tell if he was a good guy or a bad guy (I settled on kinda of good guy). The chemistry with Dr Eilliot was forced and I felt like I was being convinced of the love between them. I am a big fan of Rochelle's books so I am going to give her a pass on this story. It's not a total loss there are some funny and endearing parts of the story. The heroine is a strong woman who does not allow others to take advantage of her. This book just missed the mark.

I actually love the book "Butterfly." I thought Ms. Alers did a wonderful job of portraying the characters. In my opinion the main focus of this book was about Seneca, a young woman trying to find her way in life. After suffering through the emotional and mental abuse at the hand of her mother. The book "Butterfly" also teaches the reader valuable lessons like, beauty is skin deep. Ms. Alers takes the reader on a journey through the highs and lows of Seneca's life as a daughter, sister, girlfriend, and a upcoming model. I personally did not want to put the book down because I was anticipating what other twist and turns Seneca's life would take. Furthermore, I don't think Ms. Alers intended for "Butterfly" to be a romance. I think she intended for this to be about a young woman's personal journey, not just to become a model, but to mature into a well rounded person. Overall the book "Butterfly" was a good read.

I have been a fan of Rochelle Alers' books since reading "Happily Ever After" in the mid '90s, and have since read quite a lot of her books, and "Butterfly" is by far the absolute worst. The product description describes essentially the last 1/3 of the book, leaving you confused through the beginning and middle. The character development is shoddy, and the plot is muddled and underdeveloped. Seneca's personality is written as if she is bipolar or schizophrenic, leaving you wondering how she is the "heroine" of this saga. I don't know if this is Ms. Alers' attempt to keep pace with the current literary climate, which is pouring out gritty urban dramas, but this book is a complete failure.

Blessed with an undeniable beauty, Seneca Houston was destined to become a supermodel. Born to wealthy parents who want the best education for their children, her relationship with her mother was not the best. Her mom's college career and future were dramatically changed when she discovered she was pregnant with Seneca. Needless to say, she does not support her daughter's decision to forego her education for a modeling career and she's very vocal about it.

Seneca experiences great fame and ultimate opportunities globally as a model and quickly rises to the status of a supermodel. As a result, her personal relationships are not as successful. She loses friends, family members and lovers on her rise to the top. After evaluating her life and all her sacrifices, she makes life changing decisions regarding her career, family and romance.

BUTTERFLY starts out strong, as we are introduced to Seneca Houston at the beginning of her career, but shortly thereafter, it gets rushed and muddled. It seems Alers spent a lot of time setting the story up but failed in the development throughout the course of the tale. I had a problem warming up to Seneca's character who was too self-involved and quick to dismiss a situation based on what she thought instead of communicating with the person she had an issue with. And it seemed the author placed too much emphasis on Seneca's beauty without showing her compassionate and personable side. The ending, which seemed to be the story line that needed the most development and could have carried the novel, was compacted in a few short pages.

Reviewed by Paula Henderson

of the RAWSISTAZ(tm) Reviewers

Although I did like this story and I don't feel that Seneca was portrayed as a weak woman at all I have to agree with the other reviewers in by saying that there was too much time spent building the back story and a relationship that had Seneca finally finding love then in twenty pages until then in she meets the doctor and falls in love felt like the end was forced.

As a Rochelle Alers fan I am very disappointed in this book. There was quite a problem with character development and I felt like the love between Seneca and the doctor was forced. Seneca as the main character just didn't work for me, I just found it so hard to believe that Seneca could be so naive.

Even though I didn't really like this book, this will not deter me from future books my Ms. Alers.

I enjoy most of Rochelle Alers books, but this was not one of them. For a woman who was supposed to be strong Seneca Houston allowed the men in her life to use her. She always came back to conquer any situation but the process was always slow. I just didn't believe in her, and lost interest in the characters very early on.

I really did like this book, but I could have used a little bit more interaction with the doctor and Butterfly. I'm a huge Rochelle Alers fan, but this was just an okay book. Her agent left something to be desired. The problem with her mother should have been explained early on and the things that happened throughout ticked me off a little bit. I loved her fiestiness, but even her first relationship was questionable.

Awesome story of family, betrayal, sex, money and fame - All of these things Seneca faced and she did it well. Mz. Alers does an excellent job of including powerful supporting characters that really keeps this book as a page turner! Seneca aka Butterfly is not perfect and I like that.

To say that I was disappointed in this book would be an understatement. I have read and enjoyed other books by this author. However this one did not work on any level for me.

The book starts out when the heroine, Seneca, is in her late 30s and is retired from modelling. A biographer who is doing a book on famous models is at her home interviewing her for her portion of the book. She begins to tell him about her beginnings. At this point the book goes into flashback mode and starts the narrative when Seneca is an 18 year old college student and sometime catalog model.

It is at this point that everything falls apart in the book for me. At first I was a little disoriented because in the prologue talking to the biographer, Seneca is 37 years old. When the flashback narrative begins she is 18 years old. So there is a 19 year difference there. I expected us to flashback to the early 90s. But while she is at a party meeting a handsome athlete, she starts musing about athletes and models getting together and references Tom Brady having just married Gisele Bundchen as a trend starting. And there are other things mentioned that waaay post-date the early 90s such as the movie The Departed. So, okay, we are in 2010 in the flashback. That must mean the flashback is present time and the prologue is 19 years in the future, 2029? Ok I can live with that ....except when she retires she talks about going on Larry King or talking to Barbara Walters to talk about her retirement. Now, I suppose Larry and Babs are still kicking 20 years later, but Larry would be around 97 years old and Barbara would be 100. So at this point, I try to ignore timing inconsistencies and get on with the story.

But then I keep getting distracted by weird little things. Like the info dumps and the repetitive phrases. Every time we meet a new character, that person's background, thoughts, personality traits and a complete description of height, weight, skin color and clothing down to the designers is given to us. We need to know (in detail) what Seneca thinks about each person and what each person (in detail) thinks about Seneca. And oh, btw, we need their complete biography as well. And this is just at the character intro. There were also phrases that popped up a lot. People didn't just talk to each other, they 'crooned'. I checked my kindle and there were 17 instances of the phrase "crooned'. There were also several 'pregnant pauses' and 'peering through lashes.' BTW, I tried to peer at someone through my lashes and I either looked like I was sleeping or squinting. Maybe I don't have long enough lashes?

Also, people were referred to by both their first and last names. A lot. Sometimes we got full middle names as well. At one point Seneca and her brother are having a casual lunch and talking about their mother needing full time care and her brother says 'Dahlia Houston is my mother, I can't abandon her.' Who talks like that?

Okay so, the repetitive phrases and the need to refer to the characters by both names throughout the book, are relatively minor things. Those are nitpicky. In any book the three things that loom large in my opinion are: characters, plot and writing. Overall my opinion of the writing in this story is that it came off as stilted and awkward. Again a huge disappointment because I know this author can be a very good writer. But this book could not prove that for me. Ans really, I can overlook even awkward writing if I am entertained enough. I wasn't.

Which leaves the characters and the plot.

The plot is fairly basic. It is the story of the rise of this woman Seneca Houston to the heights of supermodel super stardom. And I guess her fall. But not really. My first problem with the plot is that for something that takes place in 2010 (..there I go with my timeline again....) it felt very dated. I often felt like I was reading one of those glitzy 80s women's fic books by Judith Krantz or Jackie Collins. And the second, probably biggest, problem with he plot is that so much of it hung on Seneca.

Which brings me to characterization.

I hated Seneca. The author did her level best to make Seneca all wonderful things to all people. She was intelligent, strong, articulate, she knew her mind, she had a hard shell and yet she was innocent, vulnerable, and victimized. She was also drop dead gorgeous. Every time she walked in a room, people stopped and stared, men all wanted her. Conversation would cease and all heads would turn. Her face is perfectly symmetrical. Her figure is wand slim, yet curvaceous at the same time. The first time working with a runway choreographer she was told her walk was terrible. so what happens? Seneca tells him to put on some music, she closes her eyes to envision a butterfly taking wing and voila! she has a perfect signature walk! She is plucked out of catalog modelling obscurity and made into the featured model on her very fist, high fashion runway show.

Because Seneca was so many (perfect) things, I could never get a handle on this character. I couldn't find a single trait that made her at all sympathetic to me. She annoyed me because everyone else was wrong and imperfect and she was always right. Every single person turned on her. They were either jealous of her beauty or fame or they were resentful of her money and her connections. With the exception of the fashion designer who only ever designed clothes with her in mind or the photographer who loving photographed her perfectly symmetrical features, not a single person was portrayed positively. Her mother, her brother, her sister, her sister-in-law, her roommate, her boyfriends etc, etc. Every single other character was made into some type of garden variety villain in some way with Seneca as their favorite victim. Rather than making me like her, it actually made me scratch my head at how wildly inconsistent the characters were portrayed. People who were reasonable in one scene turned into raging crazies in the next scene just to create conflict for poor Seneca.

Truthfully, I was disliking this book about 25% of the way through and it should have been a DNF, but I slogged through. Not recommended.