Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

I apologize for the lack of posts this month. I have been very busy at school, specifically trying to get settled in all of my classes this semester. I have only read two books in 2020 thus far, but my reading pace has been picking up over the past week! I was able to complete Perfect Little Children by Sophie Hannah in just three days, and if that doesn’t explain how much I enjoyed it, I don’t know what does!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

All Beth has to do is drive her son to his Under-14s away match, watch him play, and bring him home.
Just because she knows her ex-best friend lives near the football ground, that doesn’t mean she has to drive past her house and try to catch a glimpse of her. Why would Beth do that, and risk dredging up painful memories? She hasn’t seen Flora for twelve years. She doesn’t want to see her today, or ever again.
But she can’t resist. She parks outside the open gates of Newnham House, watches from across the road as Flora and her children Thomas and Emily step out of the car. Except… There’s something terribly wrong. Flora looks the same, only older. As Beth would have expected. It’s the children. Twelve years ago, Thomas and Emily were five and three years old. Today, they look precisely as they did then.
They are still five and three. They are Thomas and Emily without a doubt – Hilary hears Flora call them by their names – but they haven’t changed at all.
They are no taller, no older… Why haven’t they grown?

This book was really, really excellent. I had never read anything from Sophie Hannah before, and I was very pleasantly surprised by her writing. It was easy to follow and straight to the point. Since the characters are English, I enjoyed the small touches of typical English lingo.

The characters in this novel were really interesting to read about. Throughout the novel, I was constantly struggling to determine if the main character, Beth, is an unreliable narrator or not. Near the middle of the novel, we figure out the definite answer, which was enjoyable to read. I also really enjoyed the other central characters, especially Suzzanne, Beth’s teenage daughter. I thought her character added a lot to the story overall, and her development throughout the novel was fantastic. I would have loved to have read more about the side characters, specifically Thomas and Emily and other people in their household (no spoilers here!).

This book took many twists and turns, however, I found the ending to be quite anti-climactic. There was nothing about it that shocked me, and there were a few twists I had personally thought of that would have added a little more suspense to the ending.

While reading this book, I was surprised that this novel was not more popular on bookstagram. Even though I haven’t been super active on Instagram lately, this seems like this book would have a lot more discussion if it was released from one of the more “mainstream” thriller authors. This one was definitely up to par with some very well-established thriller authors, including Ruth Ware, Riley Sager, Sarah Pinborough, and others. If you enjoyed books from those authors in the past, I highly recommend this novel to you.

Overall, I really enjoyed this novel and gave it 4/5 stars. It is not one of my new favourite mystery/thriller novels, but it is definitely one of the best one’s I have read recently!

Good Night Book Owls!

Welcome back to Reading, Reading, Reading!

It is currently November 4, 2019, when I am writing this, and it is crazy to believe that when you are reading this we are already a few weeks into 2020! Pure insanity! Last year, I managed to read all of Karen M. McManus’s books, and throughly enjoyed her first two publications, so it’s no surprise that I enjoyed this one as well!

Synopsis (Goodreads.com):

Come on, Bayview, you know you’ve missed this.
A ton of copycat gossip apps have popped up since Simon died, but in the year since the Bayview four were cleared of his shocking death, no one’s been able to fill the gossip void quite like he could. The problem is no one has the facts.
Until now.
This time it’s not an app, though—it’s a game.
Truth or Dare.
Phoebe’s the first target. If you choose not to play, it’s a truth. And hers is dark.
Then comes Maeve and she should know better—always choose the dare.
But by the time Knox is about to be tagged, things have gotten dangerous. The dares have become deadly, and if Maeve learned anything from Bronwyn last year, it’s that they can’t count on the police for help. Or protection.
Simon’s gone, but someone’s determined to keep his legacy at Bayview High alive. And this time, there’s a whole new set of rules.

While this book is being marketed as a sequel for McManus’ first book “One of Us Is Lying”, I would argue that this is more of a campion novel. If you read a spoiler review of OOUIL, you could easily read this book without confusion. One of my biggest reasons for not reading many sequels is simply because I do not remember all of the characters and their relationships that take place during the first book, so I was very happy to find that this book focuses on the secondary characters in OOUIL with just a touch of the main characters spread throughout it.

I really loved all of the characters in this novel. I was truly invested in each of their stories, and I enjoyed reading from all of their perspectives. Sometimes when I read a three-person POV, I am only interested in one or two of the characters points-of-view, but in this book, I genuinely enjoyed reading from all three! I liked how they were all somehow connected to the “Bayview Core Four”, but they were all very different characters at the same time.

While Karen M. McManus’s writing is some of my all-time favourite YA writing, I will admit that at times the story seemed to drag on. I am somebody who wants to see all scenes of a novel connect and contribute to the flow and conclusion of the story, and I do not think all of the scenes were very relevant in this book.

That being said, the final plot twist in this novel was SHOCKING. It will probably be one of the most hyped and talked about ending twists of 2020… and for good reason! This is one plot twist that I would have never predicted, which is really surprising since this book falls in the YA category.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book and rated it 4/5 stars. Thanks to Penguin Teen Canada for the ARC! Be sure to pick up a copy of this book as soon as possible, as it officially releases in stores today!

Good Night Book Owls!