Tanya

I'm not even sure what to say about this book. I had been led to believe that this was a horror novel about teens that found a body in the woods. In actuality, it was a series of short stories that were connected by their involvement, however slight, with the main character. Apart from the disjointed nature of this book, none of the stories were actually scary, but rather just gross. For the record, I don't mind gross, in context, but these seemed to be gross just for the sake of it. I'm not sure if the book lost something in the translation, but this book was not nearly as scary as Ringu. I'd recommend people pass on this book.

Twelve-year-old Flavia de Luce is out of her element in this, the 7th installment, of Alan Bradley's series. The start of the novel has her on a ship, mid-way across the Atlantic, bound for Canada, where she will be starting her education at Miss Bodycote's Female Academy. She barely has time to settle into her new home when a body comes tumbling down from the chimney, wrapped in the Union Jack and whose head has been replaced with a different skull. Her homesickness is gone at the prospect of a mystery to solve, and she gets right to work. Her investigation reveals students gone missing, a peek into the secret society in which her mother was a member, and a teacher with a murderous past.

I enjoyed this book immensely. Flavia's personality was just what we've come to know and love - she's precocious, quick on her feet, and not afraid of anything. The development of the other characters - her classmates, teachers, and even the headmistress - were all wonderful and it was easy to distinguish one from another. Miss Bodycote's school and the surrounding city are described in wonderful detail, right down to the general store run by the woman who is entertained by Flavia's “charming” accent.

I was a bit disappointed, however, in how disjointed this book felt from the rest of the series. Without access to her attic chemistry laboratory, Flavia finds herself without the solace of chemistry for most of the book. The mystery itself was sometimes illogical - Flavia determines the body must have spent a significant amount of time stuffed up in the chimney, but how would someone have used the fireplace without it being noticed? I'll also freely admit that I missed Buckshaw! The characters, the settings, dependable Dogger and Gertrude...the story arcs that had been built up over the series were seemingly abandoned, and this new setting didn't feel quite like home. Things were touched upon briefly during this novel that I wished had been expanded upon, namely Harriet's time at the school and her participation in the Nides, the secret society that Flavia is there to become a part of as well. Secrets were not elaborated on, and I hope that Bradley plans on returning to these topics for more detail.

In the end, I love this series and so I enjoyed the book. I can't wait, however, for Flavia to be back home at Buckshaw, where she belongs.

(I received an advanced copy from NetGalley for review.)

I won't rate this because I didn't finish it, but I just couldn't force myself to continue on. I stopped about 70% of the way through because the book was just a failure for me almost from the start and I didn't see it getting any better. About 15-20% of the way into the book you find out who the “bad guy” is and the only suspense left is whether or not the captive is going to survive. I never got a sense of who she was due to underwhelming character development and therefore didn't develop an attachment to her. Whether she lived or died was the only real “question” in the end and I found myself not really caring what happened to any of the characters. The pacing was good and the book was action packed, but once the suspense element was taken from me as a reader, I found myself bored.

Thank you to Penguin and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book for review.

I hated this book. I read it for my book club and I grew more and more frustrated by the book as I went along (although, if it matters, the rest of my book club had a much different reaction to it). As much as wanted to, I couldn't bring myself to care about a single one of the characters, and the ramblings of the main character made me want to throw the book across the room!

This was a great story and I love the “book about a book” premise. The book gives us three somewhat unreliable narrators; not unreliable in the sense that they're untrustworthy but rather that they have their own secrets, biases, and goals that don't always align with what's going on during the investigation. With constantly changing perspectives, I was always reevaluating the characters - whether they could be trusted, whether they were involved in the murder, and just what their intentions were. The plot was complex and layered, with new information being uncovered constantly. Claire's diary entries and snippets of R.M. Holland's story, The Stranger, are sprinkled throughout the book, adding additional layers of interest. I absolutely loved that we got The Stranger in full at the end of the book and enjoyed it in its own right. I'll definitely be picking up more by Griffiths in the future.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for an advance copy of the book for review.)

This book was...interesting. The atmosphere and writing were great and the premise (spooky boarding school) had promise. I was enjoying the first couple hundred pages, then wondered where the story was going for about another hundred more. Then came the twist, one that made me roll my eyes and heave a giant sign of disappointment. It wasn't the kind of twist that gives you chills up your spine and think “YESSSS!” - rather it was an out-of-left-field twist that left me wondering if I wanted to bother finishing. I decided to power through the last few pages because I'd made it this far, right? Wrong. The actual end of the book might have been the worst part...if it hadn't been for the cringe-worthy “mythology” of the Zapuche people in the book. They were described as “savages” and the plot includes a “sacrifice a girl to the gods” trope that feeds into the narrative of the “uncivilized natives.” I did not like the handling of the indigenous storyline in the book and wished the author could have made a few changes to make that part of the mythology a bit less stereotypical and more nuanced.

I'd be interested in giving the author another chance, though, as the writing was good and Faring does a good job building atmosphere in the book, even though the book, unfortunately, didn't ever drift into “scary” territory for me.

The story starts with a bang, as 18-year-old Cass Tanner knocks on her family's front door late one night. Cass has been missing and presumed dead, along with her older sister Emma, after they both disappeared one night three years prior. As family and investigators gather around her to hear her account of what happened that night, Cass begins to tell her story – a story that involves a baby and an escape from an island where she and Emma were being held captive. The forensic psychologist assigned to the case of the missing sisters, Dr. Abby Winter, is suspicious of how polished Cass' story seems to be, as she has long believed something else was going on in the Tanner household when the girls disappeared. In alternating chapters, Cass tells investigators how to find her sister while Abby seeks to discover what, if anything, Cass feels she still needs to hide.

The multiple POV style seems to be gaining popularity in the genre and sometimes it feels overused but here it was executed perfectly. You get to hear Cass' inner thoughts as she narrates her story for her audience, all the while following Abby as she becomes increasingly emotionally invested in the case and begins to see herself and her family in Cass'. As the book goes on both characters become less reliable, leaving you on unstable footing as a reader. For a less talented writer this could cause the characters to seem inauthentic or less sympathetic, but in Walker's skilled hand this feels more like two sincere people who cannot both possibly be telling the truth. The narration unspools like this gradually until you suddenly realize that you don't know what has been the truth and what has been a lie. Small revelations appear at just the right time, hinting at something larger that dances just out of view of the reader. When the truth comes out, it's jaw dropping. In most of my reading I can say that I saw bits of the ending coming even if I didn't actually guess the entirety of the outcome. With this one I was completely blindsided and couldn't have been happier to have been so surprised. It was entirely satisfying, especially because the book stayed strongly character driven throughout.

My only real criticism of this novel is that some of the mental illness suffered by the characters was dealt with in a heavy-handed way. I think most readers would recognize the problems this family was facing without it being spelled out so directly and it felt a bit like a “tell” rather than a “show” by the author. However it was such a small problem that the rest of the novel's strengths more than made up for this flaw.

To find a thriller that examines mental illness and it's devastating effects on a family while also maintaining a strong pace and compelling characters is a treat. This is a novel I highly recommend.

(Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.)

This is the first book being compared to Gone Girl that has lived up to the hype – not because they were anything alike in terms of writing style, plot, or book construction, but because it was the first book since Gone Girl that I couldn't put down. I sat down one evening and read the first half, only stopping because it was time for bed, and then I waited grumpily all day until I could sit down again and finish it. It was incredibly fast paced and, as fast a reader as I am, I was still irritated that I couldn't read it faster. That earns it the comparison, in my opinion.

This debut novel presents the perfect couple, Jack and Grace. They met one day in the park when Grace's younger sister Millie was dancing by herself and Jack stepped in to be her partner. After a whirlwind romance they were married and rushed off to an exotic honeymoon in Thailand. Upon their return Grace loses touch with her friends and quits her job, seemingly content to stay at home in the beautiful mansion that Jack bought for them and decorate, garden, and enjoy her new wonderful life. Soon, their friends notice that Grace and Jack are inseparable and Grace is now unavailable for lunch dates alone.

Do you see where this is going? Don't worry if you don't because Paris shows you before long. By the time that happens you won't care, though, because you'll want to know how the situation is going to resolve itself. The story flips back and forth between two timelines, the first following Grace as she meets Jack, falls in love, and accepts his proposal, and the second as she details what her life is like in the present. This moved the story ahead in a way that highlighted the frantic rush Grace was in. I also genuinely enjoyed the scenes with Millie, too. Her portrayal as a person with Down's Syndrome but still as smart as a whip, fun, and present in her sister's life felt very authentic.

The book was not without flaws. Without giving too much away, it did require a slightly higher-than-normal suspension of disbelief because one of the characters was SO extreme. The circumstances were so perfectly plotted that it seems impossible for anyone to be as well-coordinated as would be necessary to pull off their plans. There are a lot of trigger warnings in this book – nothing graphic but a lot of allusions to things – and they're scattered liberally throughout the book (not problematic but something to keep in mind before deciding to read it).

I recommend it but don't pick it up when you have places to be or things to do. You won't be able to put it down.

(Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.)

After looking at the reviews for this, it seems to be a “love it or hate it” kind of book. I very much fall into the “love it” category. Donohue is talented at building up a creepy atmosphere without going overboard. It has the feel of a Japanese horror novel - the very wrong and scary existing in a very real and familiar everyday kind of world. Some complaints say that it's not scary and I'd agree - the monsters are not the scariest part of the novel. What Donohue does, though, is build up the tension between the characters and with their surrounding. A run of the mill New England snowfall is made terrifying when two people are left alone in the house and one doesn't trust the mental stability of the other, as an example. The last page contained such a gasp-out-loud realization for me that I had to go back and re-read the final lines to be sure I wasn't misunderstanding what happened. I was blown away and it was a brilliant twist I didn't see coming. (Disclaimer: other readers said they did, though, so maybe I'm just dull when it comes to foreshadowing?) This is a great read to pick up in the fall and even in the winter, on a snowy day when you can't leave the house.

Final Girls attempts to turn the horror trope of the “final girl” - the blood-stained heroine who makes it out alive at the end of a slasher-horror flick - on it's head, with great success.

Our heroine, Quincy, is one of three “final girls” but is trying desperately to move on with her life. Between her baking blog and her fiance, she's making a good start. The police officer who saved her life contacts her to let her know that the first “final girl”, Lisa, has been found dead in her home of a suicide. The other final girl, Sam, shows up at her apartment out of the blue, and the news hits that Lisa's death might not have been at her own hands.

For anyone who is a fan of the slasher horror genre, this book is a treat. As I was reading it reminded me so much of Scream that I could almost picture the scenes in my head. This book is not a wink-and-nudge commentary on the genre, though. It takes itself very seriously and, as a result, does a better job translating into a proper suspense-thriller than it might have had it attempted any level of camp. Watching Quincy's perfect facade crumble under the strain of Lisa's death and Sam's arrival was cringe-worthy, and I found myself shouting at her to just go back to baking! The flashbacks Sager used to fill us in on exactly what happened the night of the massacre Quincy survived were well executed and were a nice way to show, rather than tell, the reader about that night. Sager successfully juggles several red herrings that lead up to a twist that, I'm happy to report, I didn't see coming in the least. (Others have said they did correctly predict the ending, so perhaps I should have as well. I was just having so much fun I clearly wasn't paying close attention!)

This book is pure entertainment and a ton of fun. It's entirely suitable, though, for someone who stays away from horror but might want to dip their toes into something that will leave them up late at night with the lights on. :) (Does that classify a horror-lite?)

* Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for an advance copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.*

“Am I ready to accept all that may come out of this if it works? It might give us the cure for everything. It might also have the power to kill millions. Do I want that on my conscience?”

This book was just a ton of fun. Mysterious artifacts, government conspiracies, fringe science, international political intrigue, an stone-cold “mastermind”...this book was like a science-fiction version of Indiana Jones, if Indy had ever stuck around after getting back from his treasure hunting. It was solidly science fiction while still being grounded in enough real life to make it feel relatable. That's not to say the science was sound (interspecies breeding when it comes to humans is an old trope but still firmly in the realm of fiction) but it was at least recognizable, to some extent.

The story is told through journal entries and interviews, with a handful of radio transcripts and news reports thrown in as well. It's been done (and perhaps overdone) but it worked really well here. The interviewer becomes a character in and of himself and you come to realize that he knows a bit more than he originally lets on. I got a total Smoking Man vibe from him and loved every bit of it. Interestingly, you eventually realize that the “files” you're reading are numbered and that they are incomplete - numbers are skipped with no explanation - and I immediately wondered if this was a part of the mystery. Are they implying that there's information we're not being given? Will we see it later? As mysteries are solved more arise, teasing the reader all the way to the end.

All in all this book was a complete win for me. It was exciting, action-packed, plot-driven, and had just enough of a cliff-hanger to make me wish I didn't have to wait a year for the sequel.

“People are dumb. I'll never get over how dumb people are.” The unnamed main character in Gillian Flynn's short story is exactly the kind of character you would expect from the writer of [b:Gone Girl 19288043 Gone Girl Gillian Flynn https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1397056917s/19288043.jpg 13306276] and [b:Dark Places 5886881 Dark Places Gillian Flynn https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1354988288s/5886881.jpg 6873353]. Having been forced to panhandle on the streets as a young child, the protagonist eventually finds herself answering an ad for a “receptionist” that turns out to be a position as a sex worker in a shady spiritualist shop. After an on-the-job injury she is promoted to “aura reader” while continuing to occasionally service some of her regulars. She's like many of Flynn's female protagonists - intelligent, from a less-than-ideal childhood, and in this case a con-artist. Even though there wasn't a lot of room for background given the short story format there was a surprising amount of character development. I wish she could be featured in a longer story...I have the feeling her life would make for a fascinating read. While in her new position, a customer, Susan, offers her an opportunity to make some extra money “cleansing” her home. Our main character jumps at the chance, despite having no experience and not actually being psychic. Slamming doors, blood stains on the wall appearing out of nowhere, and strange smells convince her that perhaps she's in over her head. With an absentee father, the uneasy relationship between Susan and her stepson Miles comes to the forefront, and our protagonist questions how much of Susan's story is true and how much is the result of a stepfamily struggling to adjust to their new circumstances. In the end the story takes a few unexpected twists and turns until finally plopping the reader down in the midst of an unresolved ending, which has gained Flynn criticism from readers looking for a tidy resolution. The ending leaves the reader unsettled, conflicted, and perhaps even a little frustrated. Some called it a cop-out. I call it the perfect kind of ending. Who wants a melodramatic villain unmasking when you can have an ending that leaves you lying awake, wondering...?

Depending on how you look at it, [b:This Is What You Just Put in Your Mouth?: From Eggnog to Beef Jerky, the Surprising Secrets 22238370 This Is What You Just Put in Your Mouth? From Eggnog to Beef Jerky, the Surprising Secrets Patrick Di Justo https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1417411741s/22238370.jpg 41612295] is either a handy tool for consumers who want to understand where their food and assorted household goods come from...or a nightmare for people who see danger with every six-syllable word.Di Justo, who wrote the “What's Inside?” article series for Wired magazine that inspired this book, delves into the ingredient lists of your favorite foods - hot pockets, coffee, A1 Steak Sauce...even dog food - and explains what each ingredient is, where it comes from, and what it does. Each item is also accompanied by a “backstory” that details what inspired him to examine that particular food, who he contacted for information, and the sometimes questionable experiments he participated in, all in the name of science.The book had the potential to become tedious (as it did for the last half-dozen or so chapters that covered items like golf balls and diaper cream), but Di Justo's humor kept the book lighthearted and amusing. The occasional horrified reaction from his wife over his research made me chuckle, as did the rebuffs he received from the PR departments he contacted for information.I'd recommend this book to anyone looking for a quick, bathroom reader-type book who enjoys science and food. If you have a weak stomach, however, steer clear.

WTF did I just read? The writing in this book is lyrical and captivating but it only serves to briefly disguise the fact that nothing happens. There's no story for the first half of the book and what character development there is doesn't actually make you feel like you know the characters more. The characters are so intentionally “quirky” that it creates a divide between them and the reader, making it virtually impossible to care about them. The synopsis made it sound like some kind of psychological thriller but that's sadly not the case. I honestly have no idea what happened at the end and, frankly, but the time I got there I no longer cared. When it comes down to it, this is the story of a spoiled rich girl, an “eccentric” girl, and some guy with serious self-esteem issues trying to manage a sort-of-relationship with them both at the same time. Not for me.

The cover is pretty, though, so it has that going for it.

Despite this being the story of the famous Borden ax murders, at it's heart it's really the story of a terribly dysfunctional family. Sarah Schmidt's novel paints a fabulously unsettling picture of the Borden family - a family ruled by a tyrannical, miserly patriarch, an addled stepmother, codependent and unstable sisters, and poor Bridget the maid, who sees everything but is powerless to intervene or escape.

Lizzie is an unreliable narrator (as is to be expected, I suppose) and the narration in the chapters told from her perspective is dizzying in it's erratic and piecemeal presentation. Her thoughts jump around, concentrating heavily on sensation - what she felt, saw, heard, tasted - and she focuses on seemingly unimportant details (these details would prove to be important later, of course). I am delighted, however, to see that the other characters in the story are very well fleshed out and were what grounded the novel when Lizzie's narration took a fantastical turn. Schmidt's ability to write the characters in such a believable fashion serves to highlight just how unbalanced Lizzie was.

The gruesome nature of the crimes lends itself to a few death scenes in the novel which are handled in an understated but deeply unsettling way. The reactions of each person to the bodies are entirely in line with their characters. For those with squeamish stomachs, I advise avoiding food while reading. Also perhaps food after reading as well considering how food is also handled in the book (the MUTTON STEW! ).

This book is dark, haunting, unsettling, but also beautiful in it's style. Schmidt's expert combination of historical accuracy and creepy storytelling makes for a superb and fresh retelling of a well-known American murder.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic Press for a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.)

This and other reviews can be found at www.wearebooked.blog.

This is my first book by Heather Gudenkauf, so I went in blind, knowing only that she writes suspense/thrillers. The short summary of this book is this: Jack Quinlan's aunt Julia, who raised him after his mother was murdered and his father disappeared, has fallen down the stairs and is in a coma. He and his wife Sarah rush back to his hometown of Penny Gate, Iowa to be with her and his uncle. When his aunt dies the police suspect foul play and the mysterious circumstances surrounding the death of Jack's mother resurfaces, placing the family under scrutiny. Sarah, who is a journalist by trade, finds herself drawn into the awkward circumstance of investigating her husband, sister-in-law, and other relatives for murder. There is a lot of small town drama, several creepy abandoned barns, and scarily dark cornfields involved along the way.

To be honest, this book read like a domestic drama almost as much as it did a mystery. Sarah and Jack do not feel like a couple that have been together for 20+ years with two daughters in college. They seem awkward when they speak to each other and came across as much younger then they apparently are. They don't seem to have a solid marriage despite there being no real reason they wouldn't prior to Julia's death. That aside, I did like that Sarah was portrayed as a strong female character, though I would have liked to see a bit more from her, especially considering that she's an investigative journalist by trade. She seems to ignore what felt like fairly obvious red flags throughout this book. Also, her strange jealousy over her husband's ex-girlfriend from high school seemed absurd. 20 years and two kids and you're jealous of some girl he was “in love with” as a high schooler? It unnecessarily weakened her character and felt like it was tossed in to create drama where it didn't need to be.

The plot was full of twists and turns (some made more sense than others) until the “bad guy” was finally revealed. I found the ending so convoluted and confusing that it dropped my rating an entire star. I thought I knew who did it. The author was pushing readers in a very specific direction (almost too hard) and then the real killer came out of nowhere. Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favor of twisty endings...when they make sense. There were several suspects who had actual motives for wanting Julia dead and yet Gudenkauf manufactured a weird “they're just crazy” reason for her murder. It felt like a stretch and I found it unsatisfying as a reader.

The book was a fast and entertaining-enough read if you're looking for a suspense/thriller that is neither too creepy or too tense. I prefer either a fast-paced plot or thoughtful, well-developed characters and this book had neither. I'll probably pick up another by this author (I own a few, as it turns out) but I'm not in any hurry to do so.

Journalist Jon Ronson investigates various extremist groups and finds a common element - they all believe that a secret, select group of individuals meet periodically to choose world leaders, sway economic policy,and otherwise rule the world. To discover if this group does exist, Ronson meets with everyone from the Weaver family of Ruby Ridge fame, Omar Bakri Mohammed, who supports the Taliban from his home in England, to KKK Grand Wizard Thom Robb, and the even stranger David Ickes. To his surprise, not only does this group actually exist...but they grant him an interview...

As hard as it is to believe sometimes, the people Ronson interviews in this book are real! Ronson does a good job showing off the personalities of these characters so you can really get a sense of what they believe and how strongly they believe it. It was, at times, a bit redundant, but I suppose that is to be expected, considering how similar the belief systems these groups are. And his interview with the alleged “One World Government” group is hysterical.

This book was filled with some pretty interesting information, and it was written with a humorous touch, so if you enjoy reading about conspiracy theories and the nuts that believe them, this could be the book for you.

Fierce Kingdom is a fast-paced novel that drops you directly into the action right at the start of the book. While at the zoo one afternoon with her young son, Joan sees something at the exit that causes her to retreat back into the zoo (a pretty obvious something). She spends the next three hours hiding in the zoo until the action-packed ending. This was a straight forward book with no twists but was certainly tense. Unfortunately, I never got into it. Joan does things that are nonsensical at times, like throwing her phone as a distraction to the...erm...something...that she's hiding from. She had been using this phone to keep in contact with her husband and, through him, the police. Being in an animal enclosure, one would assume she could have found a rock or something less important in her bag to throw. Then, about two-thirds of the way through the novel, the novel suddenly introduces two new characters in the form of other zoo guests hiding from danger. It shifts from first to third person perspective and we are now expected to care about these other people for whom we have no backstory or history. Surprisingly, they are more interesting and are more well-written than Joan is, but we're shortly back to Joan and her narration until the ending which, while action packed, is too ambiguous to be satisfying.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Viking for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.)

A Stranger in the House was fast paced and plot driven with little character development, much like Lapena's previous book The Couple Next Door . The amnesia-driven plot has been overdone in the genre and this book unfortunately didn't execute it well enough to make up for it. There was a very small cast of characters which would have worked if the characters were more interesting or likable. As it was the husband was insufferable - he comes home to dinner on the stove, his wife nowhere to be found, her keys and bag on the counter, and he's annoyed that she didn't tell him she was leaving because he'd had a bad day and looking forward to seeing her. After she's found and is being questioned in connection to a murder he says “he's surprised he can still love her when he doesn't trust her.” All after a single, strange incident. The one character I was excited to see make a return was Detective Rasbach, who made his first appearance in Lapena's first novel. Overall the book was compulsively readable but not particularly memorable.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group/Viking for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.)

“Everyone is faking it, all of them pretending to be something they're not. The whole world is built on lies and deceit.”

When their babysitter cancels, Anne and Marco decide to go ahead next door to a dinner party with the neighbors anyway. After all, they share a wall, they'll have the baby monitor with them, and they'll take turns checking every half hour. When they return their baby Cora is gone without a trace.

From that point the book takes off like a freight train and never applies the breaks. This was a book I read over the course of one two-hour sitting and I couldn't have put it down if I wanted to (and I did...I finished around 1:30am!). Around the half-way point you start to get a handle on what's going on but the pace doesn't slow down at all. This is a novel that maintains the suspense all the way to the last line.

The book is a touch melodramatic but I didn't find that to detract from the story in the least.(I watch a lot of Law & Order: SVU so maybe that's why?) The narration happens in an emotionally distant present tense making for some unsettling storytelling. Everyone around Cora seemed to have both a motive for the crime while simultaneously seeming innocent. Even though you know what everyone is thinking you can't tell who is telling the truth at any point. It all combines to create a pulse-pounding read.

Though it had some flaws this was a great debut and I can't wait to see what Ms. Lapena will come up with next.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Pamela Dorman Books for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.)

Picoult explores the topic of teen suicide in this novel, which opens with a gunshot in the first few minutes. While later courtroom scenes keep you on the edge of your seat, I found the parents responses to the actions of their children to be a little unbelieveable, especially considering their close relationship to one another. Overall, a good read.