Category: Mystery

‘Flawless’ – Sara Shepherd

Flawless

In the second in the Pretty Little Liars series we continue with the creepy messages from A and it’s quite unnerving how the messages show explicit knowledge of what the girls have been up to. It’s enough to make anyone paranoid, and you can sense the creep-factor being ramped up here.

Naturally there are some differences from the TV series, in terms of order of events and the level of focus on specific characters. Honestly, I do think the girls in the books are a lot less appealing; they’re all heavily flawed, and we don’t really see much sign of any redeeming features.

After the discovery of Alison’s body at the end of book one, it’s of obvious interest to work out what’s going on. The fingers are pointing heavily to Toby and all the girls have moments that are worthy of some horror movie parody. The notes from A are genuinely creepy though, and I felt that with the adult characters acting as they do it’s hardly any wonder that the girls are rather flawed.

We are told a little more about the situation between Jenna and Toby, though it’s painted in a far less positive light here. While I’m finding the reading of this series good fun, I can’t deny it is totally superficial.

‘Pretty Little Liars’ – Sara Shephard

Pretty Little Liars

My first encounter with Emily, Spencer, Aria, Hanna, the mysterious A and a whole host of other characters came when I started watching the series on Netflix. It’s the kind of series where everyone is impossibly glamorous – I’m pretty certain that few people look like this lot at high school – but the wicked humour and clever plotting has quickly made it a firm favourite of mine. Although I’ve become an avid fan of the series, I wasn’t sure if I could face reading the sixteen novels on which the show is based.

I can only apologise, and say that I wish I hadn’t waited so long.

For those of you unfamiliar with the series we focus on what was a close-knit group of friends. They have gone their separate ways since the ‘leader’ of their group – Alison – has gone missing. Her disappearance causes ripples in the small community of Rosewood but life goes on.

Just like the TV series we are aware very early on that the key characters are all involved in something that the group want to remain hidden. Their secret has kept them tied to each other, even though they don’t seem to like each other very much at times.  We become aware that each of the girls also has their own secret, which Alison knew, but none of the others were aware of. These secrets are things they don’t want anyone to know about, yet when they start receiving messages from ‘A’ we watch them unravel as they try to work out just who is watching them.

The idea of someone monitoring their every move in the way that would have to be happening here is quite creepy. Initially the girls think Alison can’t have disappeared and that she is tormenting them for her own fun. However, when her body is found in her old back-yard, it seems there’s a little more to this mystery than we first thought.

While I found the constant name-checking of brands and products rather irritating in the novel, I was interested to see how the novels differed from the show. The female characters in the book are more nuanced than we’re led to believe and I liked the fact that their roles within the group are not quite so defined. In my head as I’m reading I confess to visualising the characters from the show, even though in a number of cases they are nothing alike. The first novel ends shortly after the discovery of Alison’s body so we are left with many questions, and I really liked the device of having A directly address us at the end.

I picked this up because of a reading challenge I’m involved in which is focusing on Series reads – with sixteen to get through, I might not manage them all in one go but I’m happy to read along for a little. 

‘The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett’ – Chelsea Sedoti

The Hundred Lies of Lizzie Lovett

Due for publication in January 2017, this book is very much about the main character of Hawthorn Creely and she is a character that you will either love or loathe.

Seventeen year old Hawthorn doesn’t feel like she fits in anywhere, and she spends a lot of her time observing from the side-lines. That’s not to say she doesn’t have friends, but she doesn’t seem to really connect with them.

When Lizzie Lovett – a young woman who was in the same year of school as Hawthorn’s brother, and part of the popular crowd – goes missing, Hawthorn finds herself fascinated by what happened to her. Theories range from the sublime to the ridiculous, but the fascination with getting answers leads Hawthorn to connect with others in a way that she hasn’t up until this point.

This is not an action-packed novel, but it does allow us the opportunity to see into the mind of someone who understands what it is to be seen as a little bit different. I personally enjoyed getting to know this character, and found her gaucheness quite endearing. I found her outlook on life in a small town quite refreshing, and though the ending wasn’t quite as I hoped it would be, it allowed us to see Hawthorn in a new light.

Thanks to NetGalley and publishers Sourcebooks for the advance copy in exchange for my thoughts.

‘Follow Me Back’ – Nicci Cloke

Follow Me Back

Described as ‘Gone Girl’ for teen readers, this was never likely to be a book that I was going to really love though it’s an entertaining enough read.

‘Follow Me Back is on the Carnegie 2017 Nominations list, and the cover hints heavily at the role social media and text messages will play in the story. For this reason it surprised me that the author hadn’t insisted on the presentation of these aspects of the story being more realistic.

The story itself is quite interesting. Lizzie Summersall has gone missing, but she has left her laptop behind. She is known to have become friendly with someone online, and there are fears that she might have been groomed. The first Aidan – an old friend of Lizzie’s – hears about this is when the police arrive at his door asking him to answer some questions about Lizzie’s online activities.

We are quickly immersed in a shadowy world where nobody is quite what they seem, and we are encouraged to doubt the motivation behind everyone we might come into contact with online. At times, the story surrounding Aidan and Lizzie became rather far-fetched and felt like deliberate scaremongering. However, if it encourages just one person to rethink their on-line activity then I suppose it’s a good thing.

‘Truly, Madly, Guilty’ – Lianne Moriarty

Truly Madly Guilty

I received a copy of this from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review, and I have enjoyed the other Moriarty novels that I have read so I was looking forward to this.

Sam and Clementine have been together for years and lead a seemingly ideal life. Clementine is a cellist, Sam has just started a new dream job and their children bring them happiness. Clementine’s oldest friend, Erika, seems to know exactly what is being thought from just a look. It all sounds wonderful (if a little claustrophobic) but Moriarty is adept at revealing slowly just how things that look so amazing on the surface might not be quite as they appear.

We know that a barbecue hosted by one of Erika’s neighbours has been the catalyst for a huge change in the relationship between these characters. Unfortunately, the build-up to us actually finding out the significance of this event was so interminably slow that I had almost reached the point of being beyond caring by the time we were actually told what had happened! I have patience – which many reviewers have commented is needed when reading this – but Moriarty was well and truly stretching mine.

 

‘The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ – R.L. Stevenson

Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde

There’s nothing like returning to a classic to remind me why I love reading, and how lucky I feel to be part of a literary heritage that covers such a wide range of narratives.

I find it hard to believe that there is anyone who does not know the basic outline of this story. The concept of scientific advancement and the horrors of behaviour outside the social norms were topical ideas at the time Stevenson wrote this, and the conflict between personal desire and social convention remains relevant today.

Re-reading The Curious Case, I was struck by the fact that Mr Utterson – as the epitome of a Victorian gentleman – narrates these events in an attempt to make the supernatural elements of the story more palatable to readers of the time. While the conventions of Gothic horror tend to make me laugh now rather than feel the fear that would have been experienced by Stevenson’s contemporaries, I can still admire the construct of this novella. A deliciously dark story.

 

‘Eileen’ – Ottessa Moshfegh

Eileen

I became aware of this when I saw it was longlisted for the 2016 Man Booker Prize, so I was pleased to receive an advance copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The most obvious thing to say upon completing the book is that this will not be to everyone’s taste.

The narrator of this story is Eileen Dunlop, a woman of indeterminate age, and she is looking back on events that took place around Christmas 1964.
Eileen is not a character you will easily warm to. As she describes herself – and we obviously don’t know to what extent she is manipulating our perceptions of her – we see a lonely twenty-four year old woman who behaves like a little girl in many ways. She lives with her alcoholic father and has a mediocre job in the local boys’ prison. She dresses in her dead mother’s clothes, has evident body issues, is quite unpleasant to those she encounters and has an obsessive need to detail her bodily functions. Yet there is something utterly fascinating about this quite grotesque character.

For a lot of the novel very little happens. Then Eileen meets new colleague Rebecca and her life changes.

What follows was not at all what I expected. It’s better to not know the details in advance, but Eileen gets to be the heroine of her own story. I was surprised that events took the turn they did, and the ambiguity of the ending sums up for me the utter selfishness of Eileen. What happens to others is simply irrelevant-once they don’t impact on her life it is as though they don’t exist.

I found this a puzzling but seductive read. Having enjoyed it so much I purchased my own copy.

‘Baby Doll’ – Hollie Overton

Baby Doll

‘Baby Doll’ has a pretty explosive start. We open with Lily escaping from the room where she has been held captive for the last eight years. Along with her young daughter, Sky, she seizes her opportunity to run – hopefully, to safety.

I found the opening of the novel truly gripping. The focus on sound and the fear felt by Lily as she escapes was masterfully portrayed. As Lily describes recognising the area that she is running through and comes to the realisation that she has been held captive in the basement of a cabin only miles from her home, I wondered where Overton would take this.

Having seen Lily knock on the door of her old home and come face-to-face with her mother for the first time in eight years, Overton decides to focus on the narrative from the perspective of Rick – Lily’s abductor. From the outset it is clear that Rick is a repugnant character – he sees nothing wrong with what he has done, and the way he manipulates those around him is chilling. Splitting the narrative in this way created quite a stifling atmosphere, and I was very grateful that we did not get a lot of graphic detail about the horrors that Lily had endured.

While I was gripped by the story of what happens to Lily after she returns, I couldn’t help feel that Overton was trying to cover too many areas. I cannot begin to imagine the way people would react if someone in Rick’s situation was accused of such a crime, but I can’t see some of the things that happen to him being allowed. It also made me question my own views, as there was a part of me that felt pleased to see Rick being treated as he was in custody though it goes against everything that I believe in.

In spite of wanting to know more about the impact of the experience on Sky, I thought it was a bold move to focus instead on the relationship between Lily and her sister, Abby. Their relationship was intriguing. Although nobody could begin to imagine how they’d react in similar circumstances, I felt what actually happened was rather unlikely. It wasn’t what I expected though, so the element of surprise was welcome – and the ‘almost normal’ ending for Lily offset what was a particularly bleak read.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

 

‘Conversion’ – Katherine Howe

Conversion

A bestselling author, and Prep and The Crucible are mentioned in the blurb…this sounds too good to be true. It was!

Our setting for this novel is St Joan’s Academy in Danvers, Massachusetts, which is a high-achieving school. The girls who attend this exclusive educational establishment set their sights high, none more so than our narrator Colleen Rowley. Unfortunately, for a novel which was meant to be set in a modern high school the characterisation was a let-down. There was a very old-fashioned feel to the characters, even though they were talking about topical things, and the narrator was someone whose voice never quite rang true. Her self-proclaimed superiority irritated me, particularly because she spent so much of the novel being very smug (even when she didn’t have any right to be).

One day Clara Rutherford, one of the most popular girls in the school, has a fit that results in uncontrollable tics. This strange event is swiftly followed by a number of other girls falling ill. Local and national press are quick to follow this story – determined to find out what is causing these privileged and high-achieving girls to succumb to these mysterious ailments.

Sound familiar? It should, and the fact that the setting of this novel happens to have been known as Salem in the past gives a really obvious pointer as to where the writer is heading. Or so I thought.

We do get the character of Ann, a young girl caught up in the events of Salem, telling us about what happened and offering her account of the hysteria surrounding the witch trials. I was expecting (hoping) that Howe would blend these ideas and use the similarities between the events to make a comment on modern society and its obsession with achievement. Instead, we got two seemingly separate stories and they remained that way.

Perhaps if I’d expected less from this I’d have been more impressed, but it felt like a very good idea that didn’t quite work out.

 

‘Local Girl Swept Away – Ellen Wittlinger

Local Girl Swept Away

Thanks to Merit Press via edelweiss for the advance copy of this. I’d read mixed reviews, so I’m afraid this languished on my kindle for a while as I wanted to be in the right mood for this before I read it.

The story is set in a small village and focuses on a tight-knit group of friends. One of them, Lorna, is swept off the breakwater one night and her remains are not found. While life goes on, for those left behind – Jackie, Lucas and Finn – things are never quite the same.

Reminiscent of a lot of YA fiction I found myself wondering what the appeal of Lorna was for these teenagers – I never felt we got to see enough of her as a character to justify the way they reacted to her going missing. Though the three remaining teenagers evidently miss Lorna, the shift in their relationships makes for interesting reading.

I liked the way those left behind changed during the course of the novel, becoming that little more self-confident and less reliant on the figure of Lorna their leader to authorise their actions. I did feel that the focus on character meant what came towards the end was fairly obviously sign-posted.