Legacy of Lies & Don't Tell by Elizabeth Chandler

Series: Dark Secrets
Author: Elizabeth Chandler
Page Count: 431
Published: March 8th, 2011
Publisher: Simon Pulse
  3.5 Stars ★★★

In this bind-up, two suspenseful stories are told. In Legacy of Lies, Megan is being haunted while staying at her grandmother's house. She is adopted, and along with dealing with her grandmother's cold attitude towards her, she has to deal with Matt, her "almost-cousin"'s aloofness as well. The story of her late great aunt comes to light, with many mysteries surrounding her death. How did she really die? And how does her death connect to the present, to Megan and Matt? Megan may not live to find out the truth. 

In Don't Tell, Lauren has returned to Wisteria for the first time after her mother drowned there years ago. With her cousin Nora seemingly unhinged, and her cousin Holly and old friend Nick welcoming her with open arms, Lauren isn't sure if she's ready to face the dock where her mother died. Her aunt Jule doesn't have much empathy towards Lauren's remaining sadness, but more is at stake than Lauren's feelings. Nora claims to hear Lauren's mother asking for her child, and mysterious knots begin to appear, things tying up themselves. Is Lauren going to survive this trip? Or will she face the same fate that her mother did?

I gave Legacy of Lies four stars, and Don't Tell three, with this averaging out at 3.5 stars. As you can see, I enjoyed the first book a bit more than the second. 

Both stories had characters with very sinister pasts, pasts that threatened to affect their present lives. I liked this connection between the past and the present, this idea that the characters couldn't outrun the past. Both stories contained suspicious deaths, deaths that may or may not have turned out to really be murders....the mystery behind what happened to Megan's great aunt and Lauren's mother were the main issue behind both stories, the events that started it all.

Legacy of Lies took place in a creepy mansion-like home, with a grandmother that I hated and an interesting paranormal component. I have to say, I did not see the twist coming at all. I was very surprised by the ending and I think it wrapped up the story very nicely. Megan was a great narrator, and I enjoyed reading about the creepy events she was experiencing, through her own eyes.

Don't Tell also had a very interesting twist that I wasn't able to guess. There was also a possible paranormal component throughout the story: I often found myself debating whether it was paranormal or simply a living person mundanely messing with Lauren. I won't give away the truth, but I think the explanation was fitting for the story. I liked this story less because I think some of the explanations were a bit hazy....most were fine, but at times I was really confused as to why people were acting the way they were. On the one hand, it made me keep reading. Yet on the other, it made some events a bit unclear. However, the story was enjoyable overall.

I recommend this bind-up to people looking for short, creepy stories. If you're a fan of Elizabeth Chandler or you want to read books about secrets affecting peoples' lives, this is a great pick for you.

Find Legacy of Lies and Don't Tell on Goodreads

The Creeping by Alexandra Sirowy

Series: N/A
Author: Alexandra Sirowy
Page Count: 400
Published: August 18th, 2015
Publisher: Simon Schuster Books for Young Readers
  3 Stars ★★★

As a child, Stella and her friend Jeanie disappeared. Jeanie never came back, and her body was never found. Eleven years later, the mystery still haunts the town of Savage. 

Stella's summer is ahead of her, and she's hoping for a relaxing break spending time with friends and hanging out at the beach. Her hopes are shattered when a body is found... a body that looks like Jeanie. Suddenly, old wounds are ripped open and Stella fears that she may be targeted by a killer. With her old friend Sam and Jeanie's brother Daniel, she hopes to uncover the truth of what's happening in Savage. But the truth may be more disturbing than she expects, and a monster may be killing the residents of Savage. 

This book looked quite creepy to me. I mean look at that cover! And the idea of a monster going after people..... Sounds really, really creepy. While parts of this book certainly held a good creep-factor, other pieces of this book annoyed and disappointed me. 

I liked the mystery behind it all. Who took Jeanie? Is she dead? Who is the body that was found? I was kept reading because I just needed answers to these questions. The element of suspense was really used well by the author. I loved how folktales and superstitions played a big role in the story, with the main characters actually considering that a monster might be terrorizing their town. 

I also really liked Sam. He was my favourite character: sweet, forgiving, and determined, he decided to help Stella out even after she ditched him years ago. He was honestly the only character that I really liked, though. 

I didn't like Stella, I thought she was kinda of superficial. I really, really hated Zoey, Stella's friend. Zoey was so freaking annoying. She was like that mosquito buzzing in your ear when you're just trying to enjoy a campfire, but no matter how much you swat at it, it won't go away. I rolled my eyes so much at her. I think the book would have been a lot better without her, to be perfectly honest. 

I think the big reveal at the end was very anti-climactic. I was hoping for something creepier, but the explanation for everything was mundane and disappointing. 

Overall, while I liked the creepy atmosphere of the book, I only like Sam and disliked the other characters. The ending was also disappointing. 

I recommend this book to readers looking for a creepy book with a main character in the "popular" crowd. If you like books about mysterious disappearances, you may enjoy this one. 

Find The Creeping on Goodreads

50/50 Friday - Best/Worst Book Read in 2017

This feature is hosted at The Butterfly Reader and Blue Eye Books

This week's topic is best / worst book read in 2017

Best

 

 I read lots of awesome books in 2017. But one of the best was The Girl Who Was Supposed to Die. It was a really suspenseful mystery and I loved it! 

Worst

 

I'm only counting books that I finished, because some I dnf-ed. Neuromancer, by far, was the worst book of 2017. I had to read it for school, and I hated it. 

Send by Patty Blount

 Series: N/A
Author: Patty Blount
Page Count: 304
Published: August 1st, 2012
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
  4 Stars ★★★★

Daniel is moving to a new school, hoping that nobody will find out his secret. He wasn't always Daniel....he used to be somebody else, somebody who cyber-bullied another kid into suicide. He has to keep his secret closely guarded...if he isn't careful, Liam's father will come after him and his family. 

He gets into a fight on the first day of school, while defending someone from Jeff, a bully. This isn't the way he wanted to start out, immediately brought into the spotlight. He also meets Julie, who seems to have something against him, although they don't even know each other. It's almost like she knows something about him.....

This was an emotional book about the effects of cyber-bullying, on both victims and bullies alike. I really liked that the book started out with Daniel going to a new school, I think that this was a great place to begin as opposed to while he was still a bully, or in juvenile detention. While things like the nature of the bullying and the impact it had on Daniel's mental health weren't completely discussed right away, I think that they were well addressed throughout the book and provided a reason to keep reading even when I got tired. I wanted to know more about the situation, I wanted to understand what had happened, and what was happening to Daniel now. For a book with a slower plot and a contemporary setting, I remained hooked on Daniel's story throughout. 

Daniel as a character was so interesting and tragic. I couldn't find it within myself to hate him for his actions. He made a mistake....and many people suffered for it. But that didn't make him a bad person overall. He was complex, dealing with a mental health crisis, suicidal thoughts, and lots of guilt. I found him relatable although I've never been in his situation, and I think this was very impressive! I connected to him through his suffering and attempt to distance himself from the past, despite having drastically different lives. As a character, he had so much depth, he was truly likeable in my opinion. I think he definitely redeemed himself. 

Julie, Jeff, and Brandon, the boy Daniel befriends after saving him from Jeff on that first day of school, were interesting secondary characters who played very important parts throughout the novel. Often, their relationships with each other and Daniel were very unstable, which actually gave this sad contemporary novel a feeling of suspense at times. I was always wondering what was going on with poor Brandon. I was worried that Jeff would target Brandon again or even go after Daniel. And Julie, as a supporting character and love interest to Daniel, was both interesting and frustrating. I found her part in this book a bit unbelievable at times. I can't say much more without spoiling the reveal, but I found it made very little sense that she'd go so far as to befriend and even date Daniel. That's why this book lost a star. 

I think the ending to the book was well done. It was emotional and unsure, and it made me really wish for a sequel. 

Overall, this was an enjoyable, emotional book with interesting characters. It discussed real life issues in a way that considered multiple sides of the story, and I am glad I found this book. I'll be looking for more books by Patty Blount in the future. 

I recommend this book to those interested in reading about the effects cyber-bullying could have on the perpetrator. If you like books with complex characters, this novel is for you. 

Find Send on Goodreads

Holiday Book Haul

Hey everyone! I'm back :) Hopefully you all had a nice holiday season.


I was super busy throughout December with school exams and get-togethers for the holidays, so I didn't have time to post much. However, I was gladly enjoying delicious food and drinking hot chocolate and Tim Hortons Iced Capps in negative twenty degrees Celsius weather. Poe is adorable and fluffy, as always. I've really been enjoying the winter break!


This year I have received/ordered a record amount of books for one holiday season (unless I am mistaken and one year I got more.....but so far it seems to be the record!) I thought I'd list them off and maybe talk a bit about why I got some of them.


So first off is my BookOutlet haul. My boyfriend's gift to me was some money for BookOutlet! And I ended up getting 20 books!


I got:


Assassin's Heart : I've really been getting into the whole assassins in a fantasy world thing lately. It started with Throne of Glass and now I want all the assassins books!


The Accident Season :  Dark family secrets? Count me in. Also the cover is great.

Lockdown : I want to read some more creepy stuff, and this book seems to have a creepy vibe.


Altered and Unraveled : I read the first book in this series a few years ago and I really liked it. I never got to reading the sequels, so when I saw them for about a dollar fifty each on BookOutlet, I decided to order a copy of each.


Rapture : I enjoyed the first three Fallen books years ago and I never got to reading Rapture. Plus I want to read Unforgiven, Cam's story. I remember liking Cam best, so I gotta get through Rapture so I can eventually read Unforgiven.


The Girl At Midnight : As I've mentioned, I'm getting more into fantasy, and this fantasy novel sounds interesting. People with feathers for hair??? A firebird??? LGBTQ characters? Of course I was gonna get this eventually.

Mortal Danger :  I like books about revenge!


Sweet : I actually found myself drawn to this book by the title. I'd written a short story titled Sweet, so I was curious as to what this particular "Sweet" was about. Anyways, the Goodreads blurb mentions this book being about a "dream vacation that goes first comically, then tragically, then horrifyingly wrong" which I think is intriguing.


The Winner's Curse: Once again more fantasy! This book sounds a bit dark for a fantasy as well, what with the slavery and all, so I thought I'd give it a try. Though to be fair, I own quite a few fantasies that have dark elements. Either way, it sounds interesting.


Spells of Blood and Kin: As you probably have noticed from this list so far, I tend to read young adult fiction. Which is fine, but I want to expand a bit into the world of adult fiction. This adult fantasy seemed like a good pick for someone with my tastes.


Caraval: Intriguing premise, lots of positive reviews, and not to mention, simply lots of reviews in the first place! I need to catch up with the crowd.


Flawed : Rule-breaking, possibly ridiculous and oppressive societal standards, and the cost of standing up for something. Say no more.


The Hollow : Appears to have a connection to Sleepy Hollow. And secrets!!!!


Sempre : I'm getting more into these forbidden crime/mafia romances.


Shackled : If I saw my missing friend mouth "help me" in public six years after her disappearance, I'd probably lose it too. But I also want to know her friend's ultimate fate.


Dead of Winter : I liked Poison Princess, so seeing the third in the series on sale for less than two bucks was a steal! I don't have the second yet but I'll have the third for when I finally do finish the second. And for barely anything at that!


The Leaving: I love books about disappearances!

Count All Her Bones : The sequel to Girl, Stolen! I am so excited!


The Devil You Know : I like books where somebody is not who they seem to be....



Along with BookOutlet, I got some paper-copy books with a gift certificate that my brother gave me. I bought the books early because I received the gift early, but it was still a Christmas/holiday gift. I got :


The Darkest Night : because paranormal romance!


House of Leaves : This book looked weird. And it was. I read it all over the break so far, and I've never read anything like it before!


Seven Ways We Lie: I'm gonna be perfectly honest here, the main reason I got this was for the pansexual representation. Us pansexuals don't get a lot of representation in media so its exciting when we do. Also, there are scandals.


Resurrection : The newest Skulduggery book!

And then I got another gift card for Chapters/Indigo! But the thing is I'm gonna be moving soon and its already gonna be a pain to move all my current books plus the literally 24 I just ordered so.....I spent some of it on Kobo! I still have some left on the card for sequels. So far, I got:



The Warlord Wants Forever : I liked Poison Princess which is by the same author and I'm trying to get into adult books more, so of course I'll get this author's adult paranormal romance.


The Hard Way: I liked the previous books in this series a lot so yeah I got the next one!


Torn From You : I read the free prequel first and enjoyed it so I decided to get the official first book in the Tear Asunder series.


Sordid : Got this one because I enjoy dark romance, and I also want to support the author after this fiasco . As stated here , "what the terms don't mean is that readers or writers condone these behaviors in real life. Fiction is fiction."



So that's my holiday book haul! Have you read any of these books? Are any of them on your to-read list? What was your biggest book haul?


I also got a tea infuser and a nice package of teas from Davids Tea, I think the company is called. My awesome friend gave it to me! I was wondering if you have a favourite tea? So far my favourite appears to be the coconut cream pie flavour!