Book Review: Shadows of the Hidden by Anne Riley

Shadows of the Hidden
Author: Anne Riley
Reading Level: YA
Genre: Mystery/Fantasy
Released: December 1st 2012
Review Source: Author
Available: Amazon

Summary: (from goodreads) (Originally published under the title THE CLEARING)

Natalie Watson doesn't believe her parents are dead, even though they disappeared five years ago. Discovering the truth about their fate is one of the only things that gets her out of bed in the morning. But after moving from her home in Georgia to her aunt's boarding school in Maine, solving the mystery of her parents' whereabouts is just one of several challenges she must face. When she's not fending off attacks from the popular kids, she puzzles over the rumors about a strange boy in her math class--one with fiery red hair who rarely speaks.

Despite suspicions that he murdered his sister a year earlier, Natalie finds it impossible to stay away from Liam Abernathy--especially when he confesses to knowing something about her parents. Soon she's following him into the forest, where things happen she doesn't understand...things that shouldn't be possible.

Natalie soon realizes her connection to Liam is deeper than she ever imagined, and not everyone she counts as a friend can be trusted. When she finds herself at the center of a centuries-old quest for immortality, she must work with Liam to stay alive--even if it means facing a truth about herself and her family that will not only shake her perception of herself, but of the entire world around her.

I loved this book from the beginning to the very end. It was so interesting and it kept you on your toes. You felt like you were part of the story and that you were friends with the characters. Plus you kept wishing you could have something like that to happen to you in your life. I was glad my husband worked nights because I can get so much reading done and don't feel bad about not spending anytime with him. 

The main character Natalie had to move to a private school because her aunt works there as the headmistress because 5 years ago her parents came up missing and everybody thinks they are dead but she doesn't think they are dead and will come back for her. She isn't your ordinary teenager at school. She isn't popular and she gets picked on all the time by the jock of the school and by her roommate. But during the whole time she is getting picked on she notices a red hair boy that in her math class which there is rumors going around about him supposedly killing his sister. But she doesn't think he would do such a thing. But at night she notices him going across campus every night at the same time and comes back at the same time also. She wants to know where he is going. Well in school she gets paired up with him for a project and has to do a presentation. Well he doesn't show up to school that day and she ends up going to his room on campus and starts going through his stuff to find out where he is going at night and wants to know if he killed his sister. Well when she is going through his closet she notices clothing from a different time period. She questions him and he finally tells her to meet him at a certain time at night and he will answer all her questions. She finds out things about him that are so cool and interesting and she also finds out about things in her life and where she came from and is her parents still alive or did they really die. 

In this review I want to tell you more about what happens in the story but I can't because it's the type of book that you can't give away all the secrets and give away the spoilers of the story. It would ruin it for the reader. So if you like to solve mysteries and try to figure out things that happen in the characters lives you will love this book. I really hope the author writes a sequel to this story because I will read it. This book kept me wanting more when it was over with. I love books like that.

Book Review: Transcend by Christine Fonseca

Transcend
Author: Christine Fonseca
Reading Level: YA
Genre: Historical Romance
Released: September 12th 2012
Review Source: Author
Available: Amazon

Summary: (from goodreads) All seventeen-year-old composer Ien Montgomery desires is an escape from his family's rigid expectations for his life; someone to inspire his music. When he meets a beautiful violin-prodigy, Kiera McDougal, his life music takes on new life. With her, he imagines a future outside of his parents’ control. That is, until a horrible accident tears them apart.

Sent to die in a sanatorium, Ien’s obsession for Kiera grows unbearable. Tortured by thoughts he can’t escape and the truth of his monstrous disfigurement, he flees, desperate to exact revenge on the people that ruined his life – his parents. But, vengeance is empty. Betrayed by those closest to him, Ien discovers that the price for his happiness may be his sanity.

Set amidst the landscape of New York's Gilded Age, and inspired by Phantom of the Opera, TRANSCEND exposes the fine line between love and madness.

The story opens with our main character, Ien Montgomery. Ien has lead a charmed life. He's the second son to one of New York societies most affluent families. He attends the local boys preparatory school and is in love with a girl named Kiera. He has a mother and father that are overbearing like a well to do family with high expectations would be. In fact, they are so overbearing you often want to wring their necks. All Ien wants to do in life is pursue music, more specifically composing and playing music on the piano. But his parents have different plans for their youngest son. His parents need him to stop wasting time on music and start preparing to take over the family business now that his oldest brother, Erik, has died. Mother wants Ien to have nothing to do with Kiera and believes her to be a bad match for him and their family.

Desperate to take control of his future, Ien decides to propose to the girl he loves and turn his back on Mother and all of his familial expectations. Just when his life starts to follow the course of his choosing a terrible fire breaks out and Ien is engulfed in flames. He is left horribly maimed by the fire and turned out of his home by his parents. He is then committed to a sanatorium where they hope he will get the healing that he needs to overcome his disfigurement. After several months in the sanatorium, Ien starts to slowly lose his sanity. He is driven mad by his mother leaving him to die and decides to exact his revenge on those responsible for faking his death and keeping him from his one true love.

There are a few things that I love in life; one of them naturally is a great story but my heart has always belonged to music. So when I was handed an ebook and the synopsis of the story read "inspired by the Phantom of the Opera", my heart fluttered. I did not walk into this thinking I was going to read a happy go lucky story however. This story is very dark and extremely emotional; haunting and beautiful at the same time. Christine Fonseca is an absolute genius at capturing the darker side of humanity. While reading this story I was struck by daydreams of what it would have been like to have lived in the 1800's. To witness someone with Ien's level of disfigurement and to think of them as a devil or demon; to run in the opposite direction screaming. The whole concept seems foreign these days but that's what touched me about this story and made my heart hurt for Ien on his journey to come to terms with his injuries. Fonseca writes his struggle with the demons in his head in such a powerful way that days after finishing reading, I am still haunted by Ien's story. This was a fantastic read and I highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't mind reading a story that takes them to the darkest places in the human psyche.