Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary Romance, Mystery, Social & Family Issues, Thriller. 373 pages
Price: $8.89 ebook, $14.29 Hardback (at time of post)
Publisher & Date: HarperCollins. March 10, 2015
Book Link: Click Here
Listed Rating: 
. 1
Price I Paid: $4.49 (pre-ordered price on December 30, 2014)
My Rating:
My Thoughts: A Good Mystery and A Surprise Ending
Lauren Oliver has done it again, delivering yet another compelling complex novel that keeps a reader interested from beginning to end. This is an upper and very edgy Y.A. novel, due to the content and language. Oliver's writing style is unique and seems written primarily for a certain group of readers, as in if you have a sister you will most likely find this book highly emotional and significant. However, the story itself is still compelling enough to be read by any reader who loves a good mystery and surprise ending.
The main character and heroine of the story is Nicole Warren, but her family and friends call her Nick. The book is mainly about Nick trying to resolve her life post-car accident, where she walked away with only a concussion, but her sister Dara, not so much. Nick divulges that Dara is her opposite and is the very crazy party social going little sister. Being the oldest Nick covers for her, but covering for Dara may have been what lead to their accident if only she could remember. Memory is a delicate and fuzzy thing for Nicole but she has Dara and Parker, John Parker, who was their 3rd best friend until they grew up and relationships emerged, making everything a mess between them all. Meanwhile, there is a town wide search for a missing 9 year old girl and Dara might know or be involved, which means Nick might need to get involved. She is Dara's big sister after all, right?
Overall, great story very suspenseful and literary. This book certainly seemed to be written with a key readership in mind. I for one felt a keen connection to the story and it's characters due to my current life circumstances. Coincidentally I'm currently stuck at home with a concussion from a car accident and I dearly love my younger sister, oh and I live in a city of Norwalk. It was rather creepy how close this book mirrored me at first but I was so quickly enraptured by the story that I forgot my life and became enfolded by Nick's and Dara's lives. Truthfully this book was a great story to get lost in and a wonderful read that captures the reader, so they'd be blown away by the revealing ending, which took me by surprise. Oliver's characters touch on the aspects of the loss of family, childhood, love, innocence, finding one's self and growing up into different people. Through the use of dual narrative, flashbacks and a diary type format the reader gets the sense of being talked to and given a personal insight into the feelings of the characters. Readers can't help but feel a sense of empathy and connection with the characters and want all of them to work out their issues and have their "HEA". What Oliver crafted here in this book is a strange but great story that had a sense of suspense, mystery and hope. You'll just have to read the book to see the hope part, but it's quite a story and the ending is such a twist that it had me reaching for my phone texting my sister to say I love you.
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