Review: Lock the Doors by Vincent Ralph

Publisher: Penguin
Published: 4th February 2021

Synopsis: 
Tom's family have moved into their dream home. But pretty soon he starts to notice that something is very wrong - there are strange messages written on the wall and locks on the bedroom doors. On the OUTSIDE.

The previous owners have moved just across the road and they seem like the perfect family. Their daughter Amy is beautiful and enigmatic but Tom is sure she's got something to hide. And he isn't going to stop until he finds the truth behind those locked doors. . .

Will their dream home become a nightmare?

Review: 
Before I started reading ‘Lock the Doors’ by Vincent Ralph, I wasn’t sure if it was going to be a YA horror or a thriller. After the first few chapters, I knew that I was going to be treated to a twisty, dark story which was full of suspense and which featured some very heavy, emotional issues. As I read on and the plot deepened and gradually began to unwind, it perfectly mirrored the way in which the main character Tom, started to discover the truth about his new home and the family that previously lived there. 

This review is difficult to write because I really do not want to give anything away which would spoil a new reader’s enjoyment of the book. I definitely think that the less you know about it in advance, the better off you will be. This is a story that creeps up on you bit by bit and by not knowing the truth, it makes the revelations, when they come, even more shocking. Tom was a great central protagonist and it was certainly interesting to see a character struggling with OCD. This isn’t something that I’ve come across before in YA books. Although at the start Tom seems pretty quiet and dare I say it, a bit timid, as he reveals more about himself, you realise that he has been through a huge amount of childhood trauma but grows in confidence so much throughout the story. He is dogged and determined as well, which means that when he befriends Amy, the girl that used to live in his new home, he is fascinated by the secret that he believes she is hiding and determined to help her.

I absolutely love YA thrillers and while I wouldn’t call this a typical book in the genre, it has a lot of the elements that I enjoy. Particularly the slow build of suspense and the desire to keep on and on reading, to try to get to the bottom of the mystery. There are some hard-hitting themes in the book which were well handled by the author and which tackle some quite difficult and emotive issues. I didn’t guess anything that happened and was definitely kept on my toes from beginning to end.

Review: October is the Coldest Month by Christoffer Carlsson

Publisher: Scribe
Published: 8th June 2017

Synopsis:

Vega Gillberg is 16 years old when the police come knocking on the door looking for her older brother, Jakob. Vega hasn’t heard from him in days, but she has to find him before the police do. Jakob was involved in a terrible crime. What no one knows is that Vega was there, too.

In the rural Swedish community where the Gillbergs live, life is tough, the people are even tougher, and old feuds never die. As Vega sets out to find her brother, she must survive a series of threatening encounters in a deadly landscape. As if that wasn’t enough, she’s dealing with the longing she feels for a boy that she has sworn to forget, and the mixed-up feelings she has for her brother’s best friend.

During a damp, raw week in October, the door to the adult world swings open, and Vega realises that once she has crossed the threshold there is no turning back.

Review:
This book is translated from the Swedish original text by Rachel Willson-Broyles. Reading it felt like delving into a short crime novella with an intriguing mystery to solve which lay at the heart of the story. It is set in a small rural Swedish community where everyone knows everyone. This creates a suffocating and stifling atmosphere. People have secrets but these secrets are hard to keep hidden. 


The main character, Vega Gillberg, is sixteen years old. At the beginning of the book she is being questioned by the police about the whereabouts of her older brother Jakob. As the plot begins to unfold, it’s clear that Vega knows that someone has committed a dreadful crime. However, she is not certain of who was involved and why, so she begins to try to connect all the dots. I enjoyed the air of mystery which the story stirred up and like Vega, I was kept guessing until the very end.     

What I did find hard about the book was that I didn’t particularly feel that any of the characters were very likeable. While I enjoyed following the threads of Vega’s quest to uncover the truth, I didn’t connect with her as the central character and so I struggled with some parts of the book which were quite introspective.  

Overall, I thought that ‘October is the Coldest Month’ was a chilling and atmospheric YA crime story. It spends time looking at the role of women and how they are treated by men. Vega has to deal with her feelings towards the men in her life: Uncle Dan, brother Jakob and local boy Tom. Many of the men in the novel are menacing and don’t always turn out to be how they first appear. This adds a nice air of danger to the story, as it’s hard to know who can be trusted.

Although this book wasn’t as good as some other YA crime novels that come to mind, it was still a quick and enjoyable read with an unexpected and surprising finale.

Review: See All The Stars by Kit Frick

Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 22nd August 2019

Synopsis:
Then: They were four—Bex, Jenni, Ellory, Ret. (Venus. Earth. Moon. Sun.) Electric, headstrong young women; Ellory’s whole solar system.

Now: Ellory is alone, her once inseparable group of friends torn apart by secrets, deception, and a shocking incident that changed their lives forever.

Then: Lazy summer days. A party. A beautiful boy. Ellory met Matthias and fell into the beginning of a spectacular, bright love.

Now: Ellory returns to Pine Brook to navigate senior year after a two-month suspension and summer away—no boyfriend, no friends. No going back. Tormented by some and sought out by others, troubled by a mysterious note-writer who won’t let Ellory forget, and consumed by guilt over her not entirely innocent role in everything and everyone she’s lost, Ellory finds that even in the present, the past is everywhere.

 

Review:

After finishing this book, I felt like shouting from the rooftops that everyone else should read it too. It's really that good. I was glued to the story from start to finish and majorly impressed to discover that this is Kit Frick's debut novel. Holy moly! The story is wonderfully depicted and Frick's writing is gorgeous. I absolutely loved it.

 

'See All The Stars' is a YA contemporary thriller that keeps you guessing as you're teased about something that's happened to change the main character Ellory's whole existence. Once she was part of a group of four friends who did everything together, told each other everything and were as tight and unbreakable as friends could be. They all gravitated around Ret, the ringleader of their little group and Ellory's best friend. But that was Then. When they enjoyed lazy summer days, flirtations with boys and the heady beginnings of love.

 

The story switches backwards and forwards between Then and Now. Ellory has been away from school for two months and is finally returning to Pine Brook for her senior year. No longer friends with the other girls, she is a loner who only wants to finish the school year and move on to whatever the future has in store for her. There are hints that something terrible has happened. Something that Ellory is still consumed with guilt about but the big mystery is what?

 

I really did love this book which was gripping, and compulsive reading. I spent a lot of time trying to guess the twist but I also just enjoyed the way that Frick explored the friendship between the girls and the way in which they are so entangled in each other's lives. It's interesting to see Ret at the centre of the group having brought them all together and the fact that without her, Ellory, Bex and Jenni might not have anything else in common. I liked the way in which this was depicted because I think it's often true of real-life friendships where people end up becoming friends with others through association. The bond between Ellory and Rex is all-consuming and this lies at the heart of the story. There are touches of romance too, with Ellory falling for the alluring Matthias who she stumbles upon at a party but the strongest relationship in the book is the one between her and Ret.     

 

It was interesting to see the disintegration of Ellory and the struggle she goes through without knowing what has caused it. I felt a lot of empathy for her character but also admiration at the way she tries to rebuild her life and move on.  

 

If you are a fan of this genre and love YA fiction then I beg you to read 'See All My Stars'. It's a five star read that is absolutely captivating. After just one book, Kit Frick is now on my auto-buy list, so I'm looking forward to reading next her second novel 'All Eyes On Us'.   

 

If you have enjoyed reading this review and would like to buy the book, please consider purchasing via my affiliate link from Amazon.

Review: Sanctuary by V.V. James

Publisher: Gollancz
Published: 8th August 2019

Synopsis:
The small Connecticut town of Sanctuary is rocked by the death of its star quarterback. Daniel's death looked like an accident, but everyone knows his ex-girlfriend Harper is the daughter of a witch - and she was there when he died.

Then the rumours start. When Harper insists Dan was guilty of a terrible act, the town turns on her. So was his death an accident, revenge - or something even darker?

As accusations fly and secrets are revealed, paranoia grips the town, culminating in a trial that the whole world is watching . . .

Review:
When I first heard about this book I knew immediately that I wanted to read it. I'm a big fan of the author's previous YA Dark Gifts trilogy, written under the name Vic James and I love her writing, so I added 'Sanctuary' to my wish list straight away. It turned out to be a really refreshing read because it felt so unique and original and unlike anything else that I'd read recently.

Described as Big Little Lies meets The Craft, 'Sanctuary' takes the reader on a journey where you never quite know where you are going to end up. Each chapter was full of surprises and there were lots of unexpected twists in the story that I didn't see coming. I loved the sense of anticipation I felt while reading it and the fact that I literally had no idea what was going to happen next. The story and the characters really hooked me in and kept me turning the pages well into the night.  

The story is set in the small town of Sanctuary where modern day witch craft is still alive and well. No longer hidden away or shunned by those who fear it, local woman Sarah is a practicing witch who has helped many of the residents of the town with their day to day problems. Her coven consists of her closest friends who lend energy to her spells and with this ability Sarah has helped to change for the better, the lives of those around her. Devoted to her teenage daughter Harper, her only sadness is that Harper has not inherited her abilities.

The catalyst which drives the plot on, is the death of the local star quarterback. Daniel was the son of one of her closest friends, Abigail and his death is the spark which causes everything to start to unravel. Soon Sarah's daughter Harper is under suspicion for his death and the local community start to turn against the witch who lives among them.

The narrative unfolds from the perspectives of Sarah, Harper, Abigail and Maggie. The latter is a detective who is assigned to investigate Daniel's death and determine what really happened to him. Was his death a tragic accident or did someone kill him? I enjoyed seeing events happen through the eyes of different characters who each have their own view on the events of both the present and the past. As the story picks up pace, there are hints about something terrible that happened years ago and which has been kept secret until now. I couldn't wait to find out what it was and I loved the way V.V. James teases us with it until near the end of the book when suddenly I had quite a change of heart about many of the characters in light of this revelation.

The witch craft element to the story was written brilliantly. It felt entirely plausible that magic could still be employed to sort out modern day problems and also that people would eventually turn against something that they couldn't fully understand or comprehend. Sarah becomes the scapegoat for the town and it was scary to see how quickly things escalated near the end of the story. I literally couldn't put the book down!

'Sanctuary' was a gripping read with an intriguing mystery at it's centre. I thoroughly enjoyed it and loved the way that it incorporated so many different genres. I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this book to other readers. 

Review: All These Beautiful Strangers - Elizabeth Klehfoth

All These Beautiful Strangers by Elizabeth Klehfoth, published by Penguin on 19th July 2018

Goodreads synopsis:
Charlie Calloway has a life most people would kill for - a tight-knit family, a loyal set of friends, and top grades a privileged boarding school. But Charlie's never been interested in what most people want. Like all Calloways, she's been taught that she's different, special - better. So when her school's super-exclusive secret society extends a mysterious invitation, Charlie's determination to get in is matched only by her conviction that she belongs there.

But their secrets go deeper than she knows.

Charlie finds herself thrust into the centre of a decades-old mystery - one that implicates her family in not one terrible crime, but two. Uncovering their past may destroy everything she knows - or give her the answer she's always craved: Who or what was behind her mother's disappearance ten years ago?

Review:
'All These Beautiful Strangers' is described as Cruel Intentions meets Gossip Girl with a hint of The Secret History.  It sounded exactly like the kind of book that I love.  I'm a big fan of YA thrillers and I was even more intrigued after reading the blurb which hinted at a hidden mystery waiting to be unravelled.

The story is set at Knollwood Prep, an exclusive boarding school. I can never resist the lure of a boarding school setting which I think dates back to my days of enjoying the Chalet School books. It adds a sense of suffocation and claustrophobia, as well as functioning almost as an exclusive society with it's own set of specific rules.  The main character, Charlie Calloway, is one of the privileged pupils and appears to have it all.  At the beginning of the story she is invited to try joining the school's secret society which involves having to complete a series of almost impossible challenges. As she attempts to gain her place within the society, she also becomes embroiled in the secret of her mother's disappearance ten years ago.  As she begins to connect the dots, long-buried secrets finally threaten to become exposed.

The plot switches backwards and forwards between Charlie in 2017 and her mother Grace in 2007.  It was interesting to see her mother's life unravelling as Charlie begins to realise that the events of the past and the present are linked together.  I actually think I enjoyed the Grace chapters more than the ones from Charlie's perspective.  Probably because Charlie wasn't immensely likable and there seemed to be a lot of flaws in her character.  She definitely matures a lot throughout the book though and there's hope that she will be a better person by the end of the story.  I also wasn't madly keen on any of the male figures which was a shame because there were one or two who had real potential.

I enjoyed the mystery element to the plot and finding out what really happened to Grace so many years ago.  I definitely didn't have any inkling about who was going to be involved, so it was nice to feel completely surprised when the big reveal finally came.  This is a pretty long book at nearly 500 pages and while I thought that the mystery was well written and plotted, it was possibly a bit too drawn out and a tad long in places.  It felt like some of the suspense was slightly lost owing to the length of the story and the pace might have benefited from a few cuts here and there.  Saying that, the ending fell a little flat because it all seemed a bit rushed in the final chapters.  Suddenly everything was wrapped up quite quickly and I was still left with a few unanswered questions.

If you enjoy YA thrillers and you're looking for mystery and suspense then this could be your kind of book.  I would have liked it to have been more fast-paced but overall it was very good and I didn't find it easy to put down once I'd started it.  Overall, a terrific debut and I look forward to reading more by Elizabeth Klehfoth in the future.