Tag: thriller book

Reviews

The Paris Apartment Review

by amyleighreadsLeave a Comment on The Paris Apartment Review

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

Jess needs a fresh start. She’s broke and alone, and she’s just left her job under less than ideal circumstances. Her half-brother Ben didn’t sound thrilled when she asked if she could crash with him for a bit, but he didn’t say no, and surely everything will look better from Paris. Only when she shows up – to find a very nice apartment, could Ben really have afforded this? – he’s not there.

Jess’s character felt new and fresh to me. I liked the fact that she’s led a completely different life to Ben and even though they’ve had their differences and grown apart she doesn’t give up her search. She’s definitely wary of those around her and I appreciated how she didn’t just take everyone’s word at face value and dug around a little more to unearth all the dirty little secrets.

The multiple POVs were a great touch I think. It made it easier to differentiate between all the different characters and added depth to the plot. Learning what everyone was doing prior to Ben’s disappearance and seeing how they all weave together was very satisfying.

The setting of this apartment building in Paris was fantastic. We really get a sense of just how gritty and dark Paris can be and how one’s perception of a place can just be so wrong. Having all the secret passages between the apartments and the mysterious nature of the concierge added to the overall tone of the book.

In terms of all the different twists and reveals it was very dramatic for sure. I can’t say it was the most shocking thriller book I’ve read but I feel like the entertainment factor was so high that I was just happy to go along for the ride. In retrospect the main twist was quite obvious but during my read I really didn’t predict any of the main plot points which made for a easy and fun experience.

⭐️4/5 stars I was here for the drama of it all!

Reviews

Local Woman Missing Review

by amyleighreadsLeave a Comment on Local Woman Missing Review

*A FEW SPOILERS*

Shelby Tebow is the first to go missing. Not long after, Meredith Dickey and her six-year-old daughter, Delilah, vanish just blocks away from where Shelby was last seen, striking fear into their once-peaceful community. Are these incidents connected? After an elusive search that yields more questions than answers, the case eventually goes cold. Now, 11 years later, Delilah shockingly returns. Everyone wants to know what happened to her, but no one is prepared for what they’ll find….

First of all reading from Delilah’s point of view those first few chapters where we find out what happened to her was horrible. I can’t imagine being in that situation, being abused and starved on a regular basis for years and still having the courage to fight and break free from her captors. It really showed her resilience and perseverance and I was glad she was able to escape from those horrors and find her way back to her family!

Meredith on the other hand I didn’t really care all to much about. She clearly has taken on too much with her two jobs and taking care of Leo and Delilah, letting things go where she would of otherwise taken a lot more serious. I don’t understand why she didn’t just tell her husband about what was going on with Shelby and that malpractice case as well as the threatening texts she was receiving. She claims to love and trust him more than anything yet she’s keeping all of these secrets from him, struggling to maintain her lifestyle and feeling guilty about sending her son to day care when she doesn’t even really need to work.

I was confused as to why we were getting the perspective from Kate but she definitely added much needed context and diversity to the storyline. I can’t say I was particularly attached to either of them but their dynamic was interesting to read from and to get an outside but still close look at the aftermath of Meredith and Delilah going missing. Leo’s perspective was my favourite though! I loved his candour and unapologetic nature of his thoughts and feelings. He has had to deal with a lot growing up under the shadow of this tragedy and more often than not he is overlooked and unappreciated.

The pacing started off a little slow for me and I found myself getting disinterested the first half of the book. But then when we start finding out about what happened to Shelby and then when all of the timelines converge and we get the full truth it all felt a bit rushed. I can’t honestly say this would be a believable scenario that would ever play out, it was a little over the top and ridiculous but still entertaining and unpredictable!

⭐️3/5 stars Good not great!

Reviews

My Heart is a Chainsaw Review

by amyleighreadsLeave a Comment on My Heart is a Chainsaw Review

*SOME SPOILERS*

Jade Daniels is an angry, half-Indian outcast with an abusive father, an absent mother, and an entire town that wants nothing to do with her. She lives in her own world, a world in which protection comes from an unusual source: horror movies…especially the ones where a masked killer seeks revenge on a world that wronged them. And Jade narrates the quirky history of Proofrock as if it is one of those movies. But when blood actually starts to spill into the waters of Indian Lake, she pulls us into her dizzying, encyclopedic mind of blood and masked murderers, and predicts exactly how the plot will unfold.

Jade as our main protagonist is very interesting. She very much pulls you into this world of slashers and she is the kind of character that you can form a bond for pretty quickly. There’s a sense of mystery surrounding her and her circumstances about why she chose to try to commit suicide right at the start of the book and her obsession with slashers. Her relationship with her father and mother were also an interesting aspect of the story and even though it isn’t fully explored we definitely get a sense of what went on earlier in Jade’s life.

I understand how her essay’s to Mr Harvey that are inserted are a way to give us more context as to Jade’s frame of mind and just how ingrained these movies are into her psyche but they pulled me out of the story. I skimmed through the majority of them simply because after the first two or three I wasn’t interested in what she was saying. I was kind of bored and wanted to get back to the actual plot and figuring out who this killer was.

Even though the other characters are the main protagonists in Jade’s slasher plot she keeps a majority of them at a distance so we don’t get to know a lot of them in depth. I didn’t feel connected to any of them and when the killings actually started I wasn’t all that horrified that these people had died. Sure their injuries were gruesome and the descriptions certainly didn’t shy away from all the nitty gritty but because the connection wasn’t there the stakes were low.

I don’t know whether it’s Stephen Graham Jones’ writing style or just Jade’s perspective in particular but I was confused as to what was happening for the majority of the story. Where she was and what she was doing and also who she was talking to, it was framed in a way that was a bit too chaotic for me. She was kind of devolving slowly but also as people kept dying she was become more assured of her predictions. It was very much a stream of consciousness style of writing and I couldn’t really follow along and appreciate it as much as others seem to.

⭐️2/5 stars Just not for me…

Reviews

Reckless Girls Review

by amyleighreadsLeave a Comment on Reckless Girls Review

*SPOILERS BELOW*

When Lux McAllister and her boyfriend, Nico, are hired to sail two women to a remote island in the South Pacific, it seems like the opportunity of a lifetime. Stuck in a dead-end job in Hawaii, and longing to travel the world after a family tragedy, Lux is eager to climb on board The Susannah and set out on an adventure. She’s also quick to bond with their passengers, college best friends Brittany and Amma. The two women say they want to travel off the beaten path. But like Lux, they may have other reasons to be seeking an escape.

Lux was definitely an interesting perspective. She just comes across as quite lost and without a tether really holding her anywhere since her mother died. Then she met Nico and attached herself to him and his dream and is now disappointed with how things have worked out for her. She has the potential to be a very strong, independent woman but just acquiesces to Nico’s every whim and allows him to be very dismissive of her and her feelings, which then builds up until she completely unloads on him when she is at her breaking point. I don’t really like how she is so blase towards Amma and Nico and I feel like she let them off way too easily, I wanted more of a rage fuelled drawn out fight or argument.

I think what would of made me love this book more is if we had another perspective in the now. Lux got to be a bit tedious at times and even though she goes through this emotional awakening during the plot and stands up for herself and calls out the insanity that Chloe and Brittany created. She knew that something was off with how everyone was reacting to Harvey being missing and then the radio situation but just let things slide a little too much.

The dual timelines I really enjoyed. It gave a lot of these characters depth and added much needed context to the story and how all of they all ended up at this ‘off the beaten track’ island. In hindsight it’s kind of glaringly obvious who everyone was and how they are connected but as I was reading I had no idea. I ended up really despising Nico in the end and I was glad that he died but I wanted to see him actually get killed. To not get to witness it and just have Lux coming across his body like she did with Harvey and Amma was underwhelming.

I liked that we got to read about the journey to the island from Hawaii and there was some action scenes sailing through the storm. The actual setting of the island though was great. The forced proximity and isolation made the tension continuously build throughout the course of the storyline. The addition of Harvey was kind of an obvious red herring to me, I would of been more inclined to believe he was going to have more of an impact had they had just a few more interactions with him as a group. But otherwise the atmosphere was suspenseful, the twists I could not see coming at all and I was overall entertained!

⭐️4/5 stars This was a wild one!