Top positive review
4.0 out of 5 starsSuspenseful story, high stress situations for mom and son
Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2022
This book has 37 chapters, and a total of about 318 pages. The story is told from the third person perspectives of the two main characters: Lily, a 32 year old single mother, and Everett, her 12 year old son.
Right from the start the book sets the tone of suspense, and gives you an idea of what to expect for the rest of the story. Stone creates lots of stressful/suspenseful situations that the characters go through, and also uses the literary equivalent of jump-scares from time to time to keep the reader on their toes. The back stories of the characters are revealed gradually, and Stone creates some anxiety-inducing chaos as the plot moves along. At times I felt like the overall pacing was a little slow, and I was anxious to get to the resolution, but there were enough curious clues or stressful encounters to keep me reading. Again, suspense is the key here; and for me ultimately the book was more about this feeling of apprehension... instead of being a clever, plot twisty mystery type of story.
Stone writes some realistic characters, and I was impressed that her window into the thoughts of Lily and Everett both seemed believable. Many of the details about Everett's life and thoughts seemed pretty accurate for the modern teenager, which is a nice detail that not every writer does well. Overall I enjoyed the book. Even though it probably could have been a little shorter, and the ending wasn't the most amazing, the book does deliver on the “suspense” part.
