Ratings95
Average rating3.5
Milly, Aubrey, and Jonah Story are cousins, but they barely know each another, and they've never even met their grandmother. Rich and reclusive, she disinherited their parents before they were born. So when they each receive a letter inviting them to work at her island resort for the summer, they're surprised . . . and curious.
Their parents are all clear on one point--not going is not an option. This could be the opportunity to get back into Grandmother's good graces. But when the cousins arrive on the island, it's immediately clear that she has different plans for them. And the longer they stay, the more they realize how mysterious--and dark--their family's past is.
The entire Story family has secrets. Whatever pulled them apart years ago isn't over--and this summer, the cousins will learn everything.
Reviews with the most likes.
Tagged as YA but as an adult I enjoyed it and questioned the YA tag. Three cousins get letters telling them to travel to their estranged grandmother's island resort and work on the summer crew. Grandma sent letters to all their parents 24 years ago disowning them. Kids get to island and slowly find a camaraderie (they had been virtual strangers to each other) and something suspicious in the air. No one knows why the parents were disowned. The kids are bright and inquisitive and by the end of the book all is resolved in a somewhat happy ending. I liked it a lot.
3.75/5 stars
Karen M. McManus books make me never want to trust anyone ever again.
I've never read a contemporary YA mystery-thriller before, and I was curious about this one. It definitely kept my attention, but I also don't feel eager to continue reading the genre. Still, it was a real page-turner. I'm definitely not the target audience for this book, though, so please take my review in that spirit. I listened to the audiobook and it was very well done, with several different narrators.
About halfway through, I had a guess about the ending which turned out to be totally wrong. So there were some good red herrings, or good to me, anyway. The ending was satisfying, although I didn't predict much about it. I always felt like there was enough detail to make things believable.
There was not a ton of depth to any of the three cousins, but that's okay, because it's more of a plot-driven book. There are also chapters from the PoV of Millie's mother as a teenager. Because of the nature of the book, these kids trying to figure out what happened when their parents were young, her chapters were the ones I was most interested in. So those were the most gripping, but she was the least interesting character of the four. Also, all the leads are hetero but there's an important gay side character who turns out to be pretty saintly, and I don't know, but his saintliness just hit me wrong.
Overall, my experience was somewhere between “okay” and “good.” Perfectly fine but nothing I'm excited about. I wanted something with a fast pace, and this book delivered on that front.