Book Synopsis:
Payton Brave's twin sister, Dylan, has been missing for more than a year. So has Payton's memory.
Amid the turmoil of her sister’s disappearance, Payton feels lost as the one left behind. Her mental state wrought and reckless, she tumbles from the graces of popularity to the outskirts of high school society, where she attracts a rag-tag group of friends—and a troubling romance with her sister’s boyfriend, Cole.
Though Payton remembers nothing of the day Dylan disappeared, she must pry into her own mind when another missing girl’s body is recovered from a nearby lake, the victim’s features eerily similar to Dylan’s. The further Payton presses into the recesses of her memory, the more danger surrounds her. The darkness around her sister’s disappearance grows and the truth becomes more and more unbearable.
What she finds might just cost Payton her life.
My Review:
4/5 stars. I can’t decide what I want to rate this. There are a few parts of the book/reasons I would rate it closer to 3.75 stars, and that’s what I was going to rate it until the end. The twist at the end made this book so much better. I want to rate it higher but at the same time don’t think it’s a five star book.
I discovered this book when I was in Mardel, one of my favorite stores - Christian and books, the best combination - and was immediately interested because I saw the author. I recognized the name Bailee Madison because she was in one of my favorite TV shows, and I also didn't know she was Christian. The premise of the book sounded interesting and I was curious to know what a book written by an actress I knew would be like.
I enjoyed the book, it was an interesting story. Like I said, however, there were some elements I thought weren't very strong or could've been done better.
Something I noticed very early on, from just the first few pages, is that the book was overly descriptive. I'm all for a good description that helps paint a picture of the scene, but I found a lot of the sentences to be way more descriptive than necessary. Some things that were described or explained in a lot of detail could've had less words and I still would've understood it enough. I didn't notice this as much as the book went on, but maybe that's because I had gotten used to it. This was something that made it hard to get into at first.
Another reason it was hard to get into was that the plot didn't really seem to go anywhere for the first few chapters. Once it picked up it got really interesting, but I found myself getting a little bit bored in the beginning. It was a lot of just reading about Payton's daily life at school, which was somewhat interesting but not the most exciting.
I liked how some chapters were in the present, and some were flashbacks to the previous year. It was a good way of showing important details and events that happened in the past without them just being told to the reader.
I liked most of the characters and the little friend group that was formed throughout the book. I liked Payton/Dylan/Poe, Cole, Misty, and Kasi, but I wish we knew more about the latter two. They both seemed like really nice and fun people but they weren't really fleshed out characters. I hated Joshua so much and I'm glad the book didn't completely try to make him a great person by the end. He did save Dylan's life so a lot of the town liked him, but the main character and her friends still didn't like him.
One thing I liked and really appreciated being included in the story is that the book explicitly said that Misty didn't get an abortion. It included the realistic opinion from Joshua that Misty should just "get rid of it", but that she didn't do that. I liked that that was mentioned, because abortion is wrong, and including that in the book shows the authors stance on it. It also showed that the whole thing with Misty having a teen pregnancy was wrong, but that you don't need to completely disown someone when it happens. It doesn't glamorize teen pregnancy, and Misty learned from her mistake.
I liked the romance between Cole and Dylan. Until the big reveal at the end, I was thinking Payton and Cole were kind of cute together but that it was complicated because of Dylan, and then the reveal that it was Dylan all along made it better. Their romance wasn't a huge part of the story, and it wasn't super swoon-worthy, but it was sweet and realistic in that sense.
The book was the most interesting in the last five or six chapters, when the mystery was escalating and Dylan was trying to figure it all out. I believed right along with her that it could've been Joshua, but knew that it wasn't based on one review I read. The review didn't say who it was, though, so I was shocked when I was Brody. I wish it was more obvious throughout the story that there was more to Brody than it seemed. It was kind of unrealistic how he went from a seemingly super nice guy to serial killer so suddenly. There's a reason given for why he murdered Payton, but I still think it doesn't really work.
The big plot twist at the end is what makes this book have a higher rating. It was crazy and I didn't see it coming at all. While it's a little unrealistic that Dylan could've been posing as Payton for an entire year and not slip up at all, I thought it was still a crazy plot reveal. I liked how it wasn't explicitly said at first, but explained through flashbacks and the lead-up to the moment, with Payton pretending to be Dylan to cover for her, and then realizing as the reader what that means.
As for an age rating, I'd probably say 12 and up. There's no bad language, and nothing too inappropriate. There is a teen pregnancy, so the whole situation that led up to it is talked about and abortion is talked about, but there's nothing that happens with the main characters besides kissing. Joshua is kind a creep and keeps trying to hit on Dylan and get close to her even after she says no, so be warned of that.
Comments