The final Reset by Mercy Jane Porquez Ballesteros

 

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Suspense

Source:  I won a copy from LibraryThing. The opinions expressed here are my own.

I love when the suspense in a book makes me read it cover to cover.  The mystery starts when  an old woman gives Samantha a clock necklace. To make sure we understand the foreboding, the author has set this event during a storm. She gives her a message with the necklace. What? You didn’t really think I was going to tell you did you?  Samantha is killed, but wakes up to find she has travelled back in time before the stabbing that killed her. Now she must try to figure out who stabbed her.  She can escape this event if someone else dies. I loved that the necklace didn’t begin ticking until she died. It also didn’t move forward, it moved backward as if it was winding down to her death. The pacing was great. The suspense was an “on the edge of your seat” type of suspense for me. The choices she has to make brings that  all important moral dilemma to the forefront.  I really enjoyed this book by an author I had not read before. It is definitely something I highly recommend reading.  I want to thank the author for the copy I won from LibraryThing.

All The Silent Bones by Gregory Fun

This book will be published on June 9th.

Genre:  Adult, Suspense, Thriller

Source:  I received a copy to facilitate my review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

I must admit that I was only familiar with this author’s middle-grade books because I teach middle grades.  However, I have discovered how excellent his adult books are.  I am a very eclectic reader.  My mother used to say if it stood still long enough, I would read it. She wasn’t wrong. I love reading works with a dark side, like this book, which is full of darkness. What is there to love about All the Silent Bones?

The opening of the book introduces two of the characters.  Both characters have very dark sides. Although the book begins with the characters as adults, it then flashes back to their childhood.  When Bobby moves into their neighborhood, Ray’s father forbids him from ever going into their house.  We all know what happens when you tell a kid they can’t do something. I immediately wondered whether his father knew something or just felt something was off with the family.

The trauma that happens at Blackamore Pond is handled differently by each boy. Regardless, we can see that each character is still affected by that trauma years after it occurred. We can see how childhood violence affects the characters as adults.  Trauma stood out the most because I had several students this year who struggled with family violence in their homes. When I have students like this, I often wonder how they will handle it as adults.  For me, seeing the makeup of the characters and the way their past created their present made them feel more realistic.  I liked that.

This book was a bit of a slower read for me, as I am accustomed to reading middle-grade and young-adult books to recommend to my students.  It took a while to get into the adult frame of mind and expectations. It had all the things I love and crave in adult books.  We have characters who have been hiding secrets.  The characters are fleshed out so that we see all their sides, including the good, the bad, and the ugly.  I loved the pacing and the twist.  The only negative for me is a personal thing. I am a grown woman, but not a fan of the “F” word. I hear enough of it from my students.  Overall, I would recommend this book and check out his other adult books.