Review #642: My Absolute Darling by Gabriel Tallent

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


“She is still a prisoner of her childhood; attempting to create a new life, she re-encounters the trauma.”

----Judith Lewis Herman

Gabriel Tallent, a Mexican author, has penned an extremely heart wrenching and horrifying, debut young adult contemporary fiction called, My Absolute Darling that centers around a young teenage girl, living with her crack head father, who teaches her about guns and shooting targets in the morning after her school and rapes her almost every other night, although the young protagonist, is clever and brave enough to get out of this terrifying life of hers, yet her emotions don't let her to, but her life drastically changes, when her grandfather dies suspiciously, her father pulls her out of school, where her teachers are worried about her lifestyle, and her father brings home another young girl.

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Review #617: The Child by Fiona Barton

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


“Childhood trauma does not come in one single package.”

----Asa Don Brown

Fiona Barton, the British bestselling author, is back with another page-turning and chilling psychological thriller called, The Child that revolves around three women, one our favorite journalist from Barton's previous book, Kate, and two different women, each grieving upon the news of an infant's skeletons recovered from a building site, as one strongly believes that it is her baby stolen the day she gave birth to her baby while the other is terrified about her long buried past has finally come to haunt her, can Kate uncover the mystery behind two women's grief?

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Review #606: The Deviants by C.J. Skuse

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


“You save yourself or you remain unsaved.”

----Alice Sebold

C.J. Skuse, an English author, has penned a tragic yet extremely riveting young adult thriller called, The Deviants that revolves around five high school teenagers whose friendship blossoms up when one of them is bullied badly, also gradually, the secrets of their lives begin spilling up, when one bad event after another challenges them to keep a hold on their friendships or their dark secrets, especially, it becomes a challenge for the couple from this group of teenagers, who seem to be drifting apart in a gradual motion.

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Review #546: All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


“The greater a child’s terror, and the earlier it is experienced, the harder it becomes to develop a strong and healthy sense of self.”

----Nathaniel Branden

Bryn Greenwood, an American author, pens a heart wrenching and sad tale about abuse and love in her new book, All the Ugly and Wonderful Things that is centered around a forbidden love story between an adult man and a very young female girl, both being the victims of social, mental, emotional and physical abuse from their own families, so when they meet, there is an instant connection between them that forbids the readers of the book to feel disgusted towards such a unnatural relationship. Although it is so much more than just a love story.

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Review #541: Still Life with Tornado by A.S. King

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


“There are far too many silent sufferers. Not because they don't yearn to reach out, but because they've tried and found no one who cares.”

----Richelle E. Goodrich

A.S. King, an award winning and bestselling American author, pens a heart wrenching tale of abuse, magical realism, teenage existential crisis in her new YA novel, Still Life with Tornado where the central characters of 16 years of age is a victim of existential crisis who has lost the creativity and power to imagination to create new art, all the while internally suffering for the bruises that she got six years ago on a trip to Mexico and also the virulent life that is closing in on her her, thereby choking her to a mental paranoia. Running away seems the only answer, but will all her questions be answered?

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Review #464: Beware That Girl by Teresa Toten

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


“Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.”

----Benjamin Franklin

Teresa Toten, a Canadian author, pens an intriguing young adult thriller about two teenage high school girls in her new book, Beware That Girl that narrates the story of a manipulative high school girl with a painful past who weaves her way through the social ladder just to reach Yale with her good nature, fake poshness and charm, thereby using a pill-survivor, moody rich girl, but their bond of friendship changes once this rich girl falls under the charms of an older man, who can open up past secrets that both the girls are running away from.

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Review #403: Mothers, Tell Your Daughters by Bonnie Jo Campbell

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


“Our mothers always remain the strangest, craziest people we've ever met.”

----Marguerite Duras

Bonnie Jo Campbell, an award-wining American author, has penned a book of short stories, Mothers, Tell Your Daughters, that unfolds the stories of some hard-working middle-class some abused and some vulnerable women in Kalamazoo, Michigan. Each and every story has a female protagonist who narrates an unusually raw and shamefully honest story about their lives that questions our male dominated society.

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Review #319: Taking on Water by David Rawding

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


“Some of your childhood traumas may be remembered with incredible clarity, while others are so frightening or incomprehensible that your conscious mind buries the memory in your unconscious.”

----Renee Fredrickson

David Rawding, an American author, pens his new psychological thriller called Taking on Water that portrays the story of a happily married couple- a social worker and a local cop, set in a small American fishing town, who tries hard to protect the young teens from abuse and drug addiction and use, all the while trying hard to fight with their own past issues as well as present. In the process, they get to meet a lobsterman and his wife and teenage son, who then become very close friends. This is a story about friendship, betrayal, drug trafficking and child abuse.

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