Nightcap Books

BOOK INFO

Title: Disturbed

Author: Jennifer Jaynes

Publisher: Thomas & Mercer

Publish Date: November 7, 2017

Genre: Psychological Thriller

Series: na

My Rating: 4/5

BOOK BLURB

A captivating psychological thriller from #1 USA Today bestselling author Jennifer Jaynes.

On Halloween night five years ago, Chelsea Dutton’s college roommates were viciously stabbed to death, and Chelsea was critically injured. She was found hiding in her apartment’s bathtub, barely clinging to life.

With only fragments of shattered memory, she’s been trying her best to move past the nightmares ever since. Now in Boston, she lives a somewhat reclusive life, working from home as a medical transcriptionist and bingeing on mindless television shows.

She can’t shake the fear that her attacker is out there, waiting to finish what he started, and Elizabeth, a nurse she met after the murders, is the only person she can trust.

When someone from her past reemerges, Chelsea starts receiving disturbing messages and worries that her every move is being watched. As the messages mount and her memories begin to return, she’s led to a very terrifying and lonely place. But she needn’t be afraid. She won’t be alone there for long.

MY REVIEW

Chelsea Dutton survived a brutal attack that left her two roommates dead. Five years after the attack, Chelsea still cannot remember her past very well… and not just the night of the attack, but her earlier life too. She lives in constant fear because the accused attacker has never been caught. After running into someone from her past, she starts to be happier and relax a little. Unfortunately, it’s a short lived happiness, because she soon starts to receive messages only her attacker could know about.

The characters were great. Chelsea is the best developed since she’s the main character, but the other characters felt real too. There’s just enough info to feel like you know the character, but there’s a little bit missing too, so you draw some conclusions that may or may not prove to be true.

Disturbed contains some twists and turns, and will have you guessing until the end. There are hints throughout the book as to how it will end, but it’s still a bit of a guess. I mean, I wasn’t 100% sure I had it figured out.

Also, I enjoyed the writing style. Disturbed had a great flow and was a quick read. I love a good thriller, and this one was an exciting read.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Books by Jennifer Jaynes:

1. Never Smile at Strangers
2. Ugly Young Thing
3. Don’t Say a Word
4. The Stranger Inside
5. Disturbed
6. Malice

BOOK INFO

Title: Into the Water

Author: Paula Hawkins

Publisher: Riverhead Books

Publish Date: May 2, 2017

Genre: Psychological Thriller

Series: na

My Rating: 3/5

BOOK BLURB

A single mother turns up dead at the bottom of the river that runs through town. Earlier in the summer, a vulnerable teenage girl met the same fate. They are not the first women lost to these dark waters, but their deaths disturb the river and its history, dredging up secrets long submerged.

Left behind is a lonely fifteen-year-old girl. Parentless and friendless, she now finds herself in the care of her mother’s sister, a fearful stranger who has been dragged back to the place she deliberately ran from—a place to which she vowed she’d never return.

With the same propulsive writing and acute understanding of human instincts that captivated millions of readers around the world in her explosive debut thriller, The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins delivers an urgent, twisting, deeply satisfying read that hinges on the deceptiveness of emotion and memory, as well as the devastating ways that the past can reach a long arm into the present.

Beware a calm surface—you never know what lies beneath.

MY REVIEW

A single mother is found dead at a local spot known as the Drowning Pool. It is unclear if she slipped or jumped to her death, either way, her death is investigated.

The deceased woman is Nel Abbott, and her death brings out more questions about a teenager who had recently died at the Drowning Pool. The teen, Katie Whittaker, had committed suicide a month earlier at the Drowning Pool. Her death shocked the community because it seemed so unexpected. Into the Water centers around the story of these two women, but told from the other characters viewpoints.

There are a lot of characters in Into the Water. Each chapter has a point of view for a character, mostly a main character but sometimes a minor character. Sometimes that works and sometimes it doesn’t. This novel seemed a bit confusing with the hopping around of viewpoints.

The main characters are Jules Abbott (Nel’s sister) and Lena Abbott (Nel’s daughter). Minor characters are Louise Whittaker (Katie’s mother), Josh Whittaker (Katie’s brother), Nickie Sage (the town psychic), Mark Henderson (a teacher), Erin Morgan (a police officer), Sean Townsend (a detective), Helen Townsend (Sean’s wife), and Patrick Townsend (Sean’s father). Also, sometimes stories are told about other women who died in the Drowning Pool. Like I mentioned, a lot of characters, which means a lot is going on in the story.

I like Paula Hawkins writing, and I wanted to see where the story was going. I did think a bit too much was happening, and it was kind of predictable. I don’t mind predictable though, so I’m okay with that.

This story is pretty dark, which I liked. Truly, none of the characters are good people. It works for this book, but there is not a lot of character development on anyone in the story. The women were okay, some stronger and some weaker. I didn’t like that every male character was weak. I enjoy stories about strong women, but I also like to see strong men depicted in the story too. The only male character that was a decent person was Josh, and he’s a boy, not a grown man. I guess that was sort of the appeal of the book, nobody was perfect and they all had their secrets.

Books by Paula Hawkins:

1. The Girl on the Train
2. Into the Water
3. A Slow Fire Burning

BOOK INFO

Title: The Lying Game

Author: Ruth Ware

Publisher: Scout Press

Publish Date: July 25, 2017

Genre: Psychological Thriller

Series: na

My Rating: 4/5

BOOK BLURB

On a cool June morning, a woman is walking her dog in the idyllic coastal village of Salten, along a tidal estuary known as the Reach. Before she can stop him, the dog charges into the water to retrieve what first appears to be a wayward stick, but to her horror, turns out to be something much more sinister.

The next morning, three women in and around London—Fatima, Thea, and Isa—receive the text they had always hoped would never come, from the fourth in their formerly inseparable clique, Kate, that says only, “I need you.”

The four girls were best friends at Salten, a second-rate boarding school set near the cliffs of the English Channel. Each different in their own way, the four became inseparable and were notorious for playing the Lying Game, telling lies at every turn to both fellow boarders and faculty. But their little game had consequences, and as the four converge in present-day Salten, they realize their shared past was not as safely buried as they had once hoped.

Atmospheric, twisty, and with just the right amount of chill to keep you wrong-footed, The Lying Game is told in Ruth Ware’s signature suspenseful style, lending itself to becoming another unputdownable thriller from the Agatha Christie of our time.

MY REVIEW

Four women (Kate, Isa, Fatima, and Thea), who were friends as teenagers, reconnect after one of them sends out a text asking for help. When they were younger, the girls liked to play a lying game. It seems more lies were told than they realized, and it’s catching up to them years later.

The Lying Game is mostly about the present day, but does have chapters about the past school days when the girls were friends. Everything is told from Isa’s point of view. While most of the book deals with the women (past and present) some of the story is about Isa and her present day situation, more so than the other characters present lives are explained.

A good portion of The Lying Game takes place in Salten, a small coastal town. Not only that, the women are staying in an isolated, ramshackle home. This definitely adds to the mysterious of the story. It was like the town was a character itself.

There were some parts that seemed a bit slow, but that was because the book didn’t have a lot of action. The plot slowly develops as Isa experiences the present day and recalls the past. She is putting things together, and the story takes some twists that weren’t necessarily expected.

I love a good thriller, and Ruth Ware’s books have all been good reads. I enjoyed In a Dark, Dark Wood and The Woman in Cabin 10 more than this one, but The Lying Game is still a good, well-written story.

Books by Ruth Ware:

1. In a Dark, Dark Wood
2. The Woman in Cabin 10
3. The Lying Game
4. The Death of Mrs. Westaway
5. The Turn of the Key
6. One by One
7. The It Girl
8. Zero Days
9. One Perfect Couple