Mini-Review: Shallow Pond by Alissa Grosso

Author: Alissa Grosso

Genre:  Contemporary, Mystery

Pages: 336

Published: July 8th, 2013

Publisher: Flux

Rating: 2/5 Stars

Source:  I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

"Barbara “Babie” Bunting is constantly mistaken for her sisters, but she’s determined not to end up like her family. She doesn’t plan to stick around Shallow Pond after graduation, and she certainly won’t be ruined by a broken heart. That is, until fellow orphan Zach Faraday walks into the picture, and Babie can’t deny their chemistry.
When her oldest sister, Annie, comes down with a mysterious illness—initially dismissed as “love sickness”—Babie and Zach start investigating what exactly killed the girls’ mother and why their late father became so consumed by grief. What they find changes everything"~Goodreads

It is going to be next to impossible for me to talk about this book without any spoilers.  But I'll give it a try.   I went into this read expecting a contemporary mystery with deep dark family secrets because, well, that's what the blurb says.  However, it turned out to be far more complicated and convoluted than I ever imagined.  I really wanted to like this one.  It has a great premise.  Small town girl meets mysterious new boy.  Together, they uncover a life-shattering secret.  Drama and mystery ensue.  Actually it was more like whiny, self-involved girl meets new boy with crazy unbelievable back story and discovers she has an even more unbelievable back story (and not unbelievable in a good way). There were so many twists in this book that it was hard to see how everything would fit together in the end and it really didn't for the most part.  To make matters worse our main character, Babie, kept jumping to every possible conclusion except the correct one in each situation. I couldn't understand why she wouldn't just talk to her older sisters about what was going on.  It was infuriating.  Speaking of sisters don't get me started on Annie and Gracie.  Annie is a lifeless character who just mopes around the house all day and refuses to see a doctor even though she's been sick for months.  Gracie is spoiled, bitchy and lacks the capacity for human compassion. 

Then we get to the big event of the book, which incidentally is not finding out why Annie is sick.  I can't tell you what that event is because some of the most interesting parts of the book involve the build up to said event.  Of course then everything goes completely downhill.  By the time I got to the main twist in the book everything was so far out there that I had completely lost interest. I felt like I had been completely mislead about the plot, it felt gimmicky and ridiculous.  I know I sound like I'm being harsh but I just had such high hopes for this book.  I feel the same way I would feel if someone handed me a horror movie and it ended up being a romantic comedy with no warning.  That being said you may read this book and be totally blown away by the twists and turns.  They just weren't for me.  If I can say anything positive it is that the pacing was good and for awhile I really was eager to find out what was going on. I just wish the plot and characters would have been more to my liking.

Review: This Is W.A.R. by Lisa and Laura Roecker

Author: Lisa and Laura Roecker

Genre:  Contemporary, Thriller, Mystery

Pages: 288

Published: July 2nd, 2013

Publisher: SoHo Teen

Rating: 4/5 Stars

Source:  I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

"This is W.A.R. begins with a victim who can no longer speak for herself, and whose murder blossoms into a call-to-arms. Enter four very different girls, four very different motives to avenge Willa Ames-Rowan, and only one rule to start: Destroy James Gregory and his family at any cost. Willa's initials spell the secret rallying cry that spurs the foursome to pool their considerable resources and deliver their particular brand of vigilante justice. Innocence is lost, battles are won—and the pursuit of the truth ultimately threatens to destroy them all."~Goodreads

Who doesn't like a good revenge novel?  All of us have been wronged at some point and felt powerless to do anything about it.  So there's something cathartic about watching someone get whats coming to them.  This is W.A.R. is a fun and ultimately satisfying novel that weaves together the stories of four girls bent on bringing their best friend's killer to justice.   

LIKES:

• Four different narrators:  I always love it when an author can use different voices to effectively tell a story.  It makes for a well-rounded story and allows the reader to see all viewpoints.  Each of Willa's friends have their own reason for wanting revenge and their own reason for feeling guilty about her death.  The girls vastly different personalities also make the story more interesting and believable.  I particularly enjoyed the chapters narrated by Willa's stepsister Madge.  She did a great job of making me feel closer not only to her but to her sister as well.
• Yuppies who rule with an iron fist:  One thing that is vitally important to a thriller is a bad guy you love to hate.  The Gregory's fit this bill to a tee.  They are spoiled, entitled and completely above the law.  They abuse their power and have seemingly no appreciation for the value of other human beings.  But they aren't just one-dimensional jerks.  There are layers to the Gregory family.  The Captain, while obviously an awful human being, is driven by more than just greed.  Trip has been emotionally and psychologically crippled by something in his past and James has been driven to rampant alcoholism by his family.  You love to hate them, but you want to understand them as well.  When you throw in their small lakeside town and the country club that acts as their seat of power the show is quite spectacular.
• Not too unrealistic:  It would be easy to set up a series of grand schemes that could never happen in real life in this story.  The girls are from wealthy families and money is thrown around like it's nothing.  But most of the schemes the girls come up with are not completely out of the realm of possibility.  

DISLIKES:

• Rich people are horrible:  I get a little tired of wealthy people being made into caricatures of Blair Waldorf.  Not everyone who has money is rude and spoiled.  Now I am not saying that as someone who has money, the dent in my car's rear bumper that has been there since 2008 will attest to that.  I am simply saying that as someone who has met all types of people from all different backgrounds.  The country club members are some of the most abhorrent people you can imagine.  They treat the staff like slaves and behave however they want regardless of how it affects others.  I understand that this particular country club had to be this way for the story to work but it still made me roll my eyes.
• I'm still a little confused about the ending:  I won't get into spoilers here but I have to say there is something that happens at the end regarding a website that I'm totally confused about. In fact, if any of you have read this and want to explain it to me please shoot me an email.  I'd be forever grateful.  

If you're looking for a fun, fast-paced summer read with lots of vigilante justice, this is the read for you.  I definitely will be keeping this on my shelf for summers to come.  It's thrilling, shocking and totally satisfying.

Review: The Sweet Dead Life by Joy Preble

Author: Joy Preble

Genre:  Paranormal

Pages: 244

Published: May 14th, 2013

Publisher: SOHO Teen

Rating: 3/5 Stars

Source:  I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

"“I found out two things today. One, I think I’m dying. And two, my brother is a perv.”
So begins the diary of 14-year-old Jenna Samuels, who is having a very bad eighth-grade year. Her single mother spends all day in bed. Dad vanished when she was eight. Her 16-year-old brother, Casey, tries to hold together what’s left of the family by working two after-school jobs— difficult, as he’s stoned all the time. To make matters worse, Jenna is sick. When she collapses one day, Casey tries to race her to the hospital in their beat-up Prius and crashes instead.
Jenna wakes up in the ER to find Casey beside her. Beatified. Literally. The flab and zits? Gone. Before long, Jenna figures out that Casey didn’t survive the accident at all. He’s an “A-word.” (She can’t bring herself to utter the truth.) Soon they discover that Jenna isn’t just dying: she’s being poisoned. And Casey has been sent back to help solve the mystery that not only holds the key to her survival, but also to their mother’s mysterious depression and father’s disappearance."~Goodreads

I'm not really sure what I was expecting when I picked up this book.  I haven't read a ton of angel books and most of the ones I've heard of are romances.  This novel is about a brother and a sister so  romance really wasn't part of the equation.  After finishing it I'm still not really sure about this one. It centers around Jenna, an eighth grader with a world of problems.  Her father is missing, her mother doesn't leave the house and her older brother is a pot head.  When she and her brother are in a car accident and he becomes an angel things get even more complicated.  There were definitely things I loved about it, but there was plenty that fell flat as well.   

LIKES:

• The writing style:  The style of the book was really cool.  Jenna definitely had a unique voice and the author did a great job of bringing that across.  The colloquialisms in the writing added to the charm and really pulled me in.
• Jenna's got spunk:  I just loved Jenna.  She was so full of life and laughter despite her dire circumstances and that really got me attached to her.  Throw in her impressive and growing vocabulary and her sense of humor and I was sold on Jenna.  Her relationship with her brother was also really genuine and sweet.

DISLIKES:

• Amber:  I just didn't see the point of Amber, and I don't just mean her character.  I also didn't get why Jenna hated her so much or why Amber was such a pill.  With fun, lovable characters like Jenna and her brother I was hoping that Amber would have been developed a little more.
• Where's the magic?:  This book reads more like a mystery than a paranormal story.  There isn't a lot of angel-ish stuff going on except for Casey's physical changes and some little tricks that go by practically without notice.  I would have liked to see more of the paranormal/angel element.
• No surprises: Everything is sort of laid out for you in the synopsis.  The reader already knows the big twist (cough Casey's an angel) before the book even begins.  So when Jenna finally comes to that conclusion it's not very exciting for the reader.  This could have been avoided completely with a different title and description.  The other big revelation, that Jenna is being poisoned, is also right there in the blurb.  

I started out really loving this book.  Unfortunately, by the time I finished it I wasn't as excited about it.   That being said, the writing style alone is enough for me to want to pick up the author's other work.  I'm excited to see what she what else is out there.  If you're looking for something heavy on the paranormal this book might not be for you.  But if you want a cute younger mystery give it a shot.

Mini Review: Choker by Elizabeth Woods

Author: Elizabeth Woods

Genre:  Mystery, Thriller, Contemporary

Pages: 233

Published: January 4th, 2011

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Rating: 4/5 Stars

"Sixteen-year-old Cara Lange has been a loner ever since she moved away from her best and only friend, Zoe, years ago. She eats lunch with the other girls from the track team, but they're not really her friends. Mostly she spends her time watching Ethan Gray from a distance, wishing he would finally notice her, and avoiding the popular girls who call her "Choker" after a humiliating incident in the cafeteria. 
Then one day Cara comes home to find Zoe waiting for her. Zoe's on the run from problems at home, and Cara agrees to help her hide. With her best friend back, Cara's life changes overnight. Zoe gives her a new look and new confidence, and next thing she knows, she's getting invited to parties and flirting with Ethan. Best of all, she has her BFF there to confide in. 
But just as quickly as Cara's life came together, it starts to unravel. A girl goes missing in her town, and everyone is a suspect—including Ethan. Worse still, Zoe starts behaving strangely, and Cara begins to wonder what exactly her friend does all day when she's at school. You're supposed to trust your best friend no matter what, but what if she turns into a total stranger?"~Goodreads

Let's talk a bit about how covers can be duplicitous.  Here we have a pretty pink cover, white winter trees, a long stemmed rose and some lovely handwriting.  Sure the title sounds ominous but how dark could this book possibly be?  Take into consideration that the angle of the trees is what someone who is on their back (like, perhaps, someone who's just been murdered in the woods) might be looking at and you get some idea of just how dark this book can get.  This cover is entirely representative of the story.  Choker is a thriller disguised as a contemporary.  Woods somehow managed to fit two different plot lines into just under 240 pages.  There were several times while reading this book that I forgot it was supposed to be a thriller at all.  I just wanted Cara to win the guy of her dreams and actually make some real friends.  That is probably what made this story so unsettling.  Woods manages to catch the reader off guard by luring them into their comfort zone just before delivering her blows.

First of all we have Cara, our main character.  She is the quintessential high school outcast.  She doesn't really have any close friends, she's super awkward and she can't seem to relate to anyone.  She's pretty miserable overall.  She's being bullied by the school's resident mean girls, their leader is dating the guy Cara is in love with.  Then her childhood friend, Zoe, appears and starts camping out in Cara's bedroom.  She starts helping Cara build up her self confidence and everything starts getting better.  It's all well and good until the bodies start piling up and Zoe seems pretty comfortable with it.  

The "thriller" aspect of the story is an ever-present force that guides the story along without over-shadowing it.  This creates an incredibly tense and upsetting atmosphere throughout the book.  Everything seems more realistic and that's what makes it so frightening.  I saw the ending coming from a mile away but that didn't make it any less disturbing when my fears came to fruition.  This is definitely not the book for you if you like neat, tidy, happy endings.   This one stays with you for awhile and was truly and excellent read.  I'd recommend this if you are looking for something more psychological and dark than a crime thriller.  

Dust Off Those Classics: We Have Always Lived In The Castle by Shirley Jackson

Author: Shirley Jackson

Genre: classic, thriller, mystery

Pages: 146

Published: 1962

Publisher: Penguin

Rating: 4/5 Stars

"Taking readers deep into a labyrinth of dark neurosis, We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a deliciously unsettling novel about a perverse, isolated, and possibly murderous family and the struggle that ensues when a cousin arrives at their estate."~Goodreads

One of my book resolutions this year was to read and review more classics.  I thought I would start off the year with a book that's had a big resurgence lately.  Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a twisted, quirky little book that raises more questions than it answers.  What is normal? Who is the villain? How do we, as a society, create the very monsters we fear?

The story is told from the perspective of 18 year old Mary Katherine Blackwood (Merricat), a mentally unstable but interesting girl who lives with her older sister and their aging uncle in a huge house outside of a small village.  Merricat's sister, Constance, was accused of poisoning the rest of the family several years before but acquitted.  Still, the town reviles the Blackwoods and abuses them to the point that Constance refuses to leave home.  This leaves Merricat in charge of anything that involves going out in public and fuels her deep-seeded hatred of the villagers.  Even with all of the turmoil the Blackwoods love each other and are happy with their lives and their home until their cousin Charles shows up and starts to take over.

This book is really special because it takes the classic idea of a village plagued by a villainous family and reverses the roles.  With this being said, the Blackwoods are not at all canonized in the book.  Rather, they are shown for what they are: an unstable, dysfunctional and most-likely homicidal group of social outcasts.  Still, the "normal" townspeople are far more dangerous and cruel.

This book was full of quirk and dark humor, which I loved.  I really appreciated the care the author took with the main characters.  They felt like very realistic people and that made the events of the book even crazier.  In a way this book was charming.  While it was very strange, it had comfortable and familiar feel, much (I would imagine) like the Blackwood's home.  I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a fun way to start getting into more classics.

Review: Beautiful Lies by Jessica Warman

Author: Jessica Warman

Genre: Thriller, Mystery

Pages: 422

Published: August 21st, 2012

Publisher: Bloomsbury

Rating: 3/5 Stars

Source:  I received a copy for review from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

"Rachel and Alice are an extremely rare kind of identical twins—so identical that even their aunt and uncle, whom they’ve lived with since their parents passed away, can’t tell them apart. But the sisters are connected in a way that goes well beyond their surfaces: when one experiences pain, the other exhibits the exact same signs of distress. So when one twin mysteriously disappears, the other immediately knows something is wrong—especially when she starts experiencing serious physical traumas, despite the fact that nobody has touched her. As the search commences to find her sister, the twin left behind must rely on their intense bond to uncover the truth. But is there anyone around her she can trust, when everyone could be a suspect? And ultimately, can she even trust herself?" - Goodreads

How do I start talking about Beautiful Lies?  I had so many different feelings about this book, some very positive and some negative.  There were parts of the story that were incredibly intense and thrilling and just as many that were somewhat non-eventful, where I forgot that this was a book about abduction and it felt like a contemporary minus the romance.  Even after reading this book, I'm still not 100% sure how I feel about it.  The other thing that has made it so hard to write about Beautiful Lies is that it had lots of twists and so I'm going to have to be super careful not to give anything away.  At least all of the twists made for an interesting read, even if the blogger in me is frustrated that she can't blurt everything out.  

LIKES:

The writing style:  I loved Warman's writing style.  I hadn't read anything by the author before and I was very impressed by her story-telling abilities.  She is very good at creating a mood and foreshadowing without giving anything away.  I loved it.

The relationship between the girls:  Twins have always fascinated me.  Rachel and Alice's relationship was really interesting.  I loved that they weren't very similar apart from their looks and that they both struggled with completely different issues.  Their love for one another is boundless but they still must follow their own paths and this is harder for one of them to deal with than the other.  There was real emotion in their characters and their stories explored real problems and conflicts.  These side conflicts enhanced the thriller aspect and made you really care for the characters.

The creep factor: This book, and especially the villain, was super creepy.  Books about vampires, ghosts and werewolves all do their best to make us lose sleep, but sometimes it is much more intimidating to remember that there are real monsters out there.  This book does a great job of reminding you.

DISLIKES:

The pacing:  The pacing was a bit off for me with this story.  The beginning tended to drag a bit and it slowed down again about 3/4 of the way through. Luckily the middle and end more than made up for the slow start and the lag later on.

Lets take a moment to talk about smoking:  I can't even tell you how many times cigarettes/smoking were a topic of conversation in this book.  Many times this theme didn't have much to do with the story.  It just seemed like the author was launching a personal crusade against smoking (well cigarettes at least, weed seems to be more acceptable) that was a bit distracting at times.  There were certainly points in the story where smoking/cigarettes played a part in the mood of the scene which was fine, but there were plenty of times where I was thrown off by why the characters were talking about smoking again.  I get it, smoking is dangerous and will kill you, cigarette smoke stinks, but can we get back to the story?

NOT SURE:

The darkness: I can appreciate a good amount of darkness in a book, but I'm not really sure how I felt about the level of darkness in this one.  It covered everything from dead parents to mental illness to extreme violence.  Parts of this story are very hard to get through.  I think, though, that it was an appropriate amount to get the point of the book across.  It is just uncomfortable to see characters you have come to care about going through such unthinkable things.

Overall, I am happy that I got to read this book.  Even with all of the hard subject matter, I think it is an important story that was waiting to be told.  I would recommend this book to those of you who like thrills and aren't afraid of some very realistic terror.

The Space Between Trees

Author: Katie Williams

Genre: Contemporary, mystery, thriller, crime

Pages: 274

Published: 2010

Publisher: Chronicle Books

Rating: 3/5 Stars

"In this haunting tale, quirky loner Evie is in the wrong place at the wrong time when her sometime friend and total crush, Jonah, discovers a body in the woods -- a body that turns out to be that of her childhood playmate.  At the funeral, a fateful lie leads Evie into a complicated relationship with the dead girl's father and best friend.  Before she realizes what is happening, Evie is on the hunt for a killer, spinning more lies along the way and putting herself in serious danger."

I'm not even going to pretend I didn't buy this book for its cover.  The picture really doesn't do it justice, but it's beautiful.  It is a hardcover that has been laser cut to look like branches that sit over the paper cover underneath.  I found it in a bin at Border's last year during its closing sale (sob!).  It took me a lot longer than usual to read the book because I kept flipping it over and staring at the cover.  But anyway, I didn't get around to reading it for a long time and I didn't expect much.  Luckily, it surprised me.  

The story is about Evie, a loner who isn't really lonely at all.  She has her paper route and she has Jonah.  He hauls dead animals out of the woods behind one of the nicer neighborhoods in town (fun job right?).  Evie loves him and follows him around during her route, but he seems to think she's just a silly kid.  She twists the small conversations they have together into more romantic tales to tell the girls that she sits with at lunch.  Her life with Jonah and her vacuous mother is blissfully boring until a body is pulled out of the woods.  It turns out to be her childhood friend, Zabet, and Evie is immediately obsessed with the crime.  She becomes entangled with Zabet's father, a sad, lonely divorcee and her best friend, the chain-smoking, slightly unstable, Hadley.  She and Hadley begin searching for Zabet's killer and along the way form an unlikely friendship.

So what did I think about this book?  Overall, it was better than expected.  There were moments of real truth.  This was especially true with Hadley.  Her grief over the death of her only real friend sends her into a downward spiral that is realistic and painful to watch.  She tries so hard to be tough and act like nothing bothers her, but throughout the book you can see her mental instability growing and you really start to feel for her.  Mr.  McCabe is another character that seems very well thought out.  He tries to hold on to his daughter by forming a relationship with Hadley and Evie.  His desperation is palpable, from only making spaghetti because it was Zabet's favorite to keeping her room in the complete disarray in which it was left.  He is possibly the saddest character in the whole book.  Finally there is Jonah.  He is sort of an enigma in the book.  He is around but he doesn't say much and the reader rarely knows what he is thinking.  This is the same way that Evie sees him.  The reader wants to get to know him as much as she does.  Unfortunately, I didn't feel like he was given a chance to really come into his own as a character.  I would have liked to understand him more.  Another character who left me wanting was Evie's mother.  She was so self-obsessed and vapid that I couldn't help but dislike her.  I kept hoping that she would evolve through the story, but unfortunately she didn't.  There was sort of a moment toward the end of the book where she seems to have come to her senses (she left the house without makeup, oh my!) but it was lackluster.  The biggest problem I had with the book though was the mystery aspect.  The whole story seemed to be leading up to this thrilling ending.  Some big epiphany and, instead, it fizzled out.  I found myself going, "that's it?  It's over?" which is never much fun in my opinion.

Negatives aside, this book does have merit.  Some of the characters are very fun to get to know and the story, itself, was very interesting at times. Evie is a sympathetic protagonist with real feelings and insecurities and the story does make you think. I wish that the author would have delved a little deeper into the characters and their relationships with one another, but for the most part the story wasn't bad.  I'd recommend this if you want something a little dark, with some quirkiness to it.