Author: Hannah Jayne
Publisher:
Publication Date:
Synopsis:
They Said It Was An Accident...
Sawyer Dodd is a star athlete, a straight-A student, and the envy of every other girl who wants to date Kevin Anderson. When Kevin dies in a tragic car crash, Sawyer is stunned. Then she opens her locker to find a note:
You're welcome.
Someone saw what he did to her. Someone knows that Sawyer and Kevin weren't the perfect couple they seemed to be. And that someone—a killer—is now shadowing Sawyer's every move...
Review
I knew from the instant I read the synopsis that this book was going to be creepy. What I didn’t expect was the psychological thrill ride the novel would take me on! From start to finish I was intrigued, concerned, and worried for Sawyer as her “admirer” continually tried to “help” her.
Sawyer was an easy heroine to connect with. She has been going through a lot of changes in her personal and school life. She is trying to find herself in the wake of her abusive boyfriends death, and isn’t sure how to reconcile the abuse with the good parts of their relationship. The fact that Sawyer was constantly portrayed as the underdog, and the bullied made her likable despite her other character flaws.
One of my favorite things about this novel is the inclusion of the police. Too often heroines choose to not involve law enforcement or discount the police before they’ve even contacted them. This always pisses me off to no end. I liked that as Sawyer’s admirer started to really scare her, she turned to the police rather then a rag-tag group of friends or something equally silly. It made the story more realistic because going to the police is something I would have done.
The one thing in the story that rubbed me the wrong in Truly, Madly, Deadly, was that Sawyer ends up being asked out by two different guys and actually carrying on a sort of relationship with one of them. While this is typical high school behavior it felt off to me. It was just too soon after her ex’s death for her to even consider moving on. No matter the state of your relationship, losing someone who has had that kind of effect on your life leaves a mark and I never got the sense that Sawyer really dealt with her unresolved feelings for her ex before moving on.
Aside from the romance aspect I really enjoyed everything else about the story. The mystery kept me up reading late and gave me goosebumps. I thought I had everything figured out fairly early on and was pleasantly surprised when the author took the story in a different direction.
Overall, Truly, Madly, Deadly was an awesome thriller. This novel reminded me that YA does not have nearly enough mystery and thriller books and that I had sorely missed this genre. I look forward to reading other works by this author!
About The Author
Hannah is the author of the UNDERWORLD DETECTION AGENCY CHRONICLES from Kensington books and the upcoming young adult thrillers TRULY, MADLY, DEADLY and SEE JANE RUN available from Sourcebooks, Inc. When she's not battling the demons of the Underworld or tackling a murderer at Hawthorne High, Jayne kicks her feet up in her San Francisco bay area home and attempts to share couch space with two enormous cats.
I really liked TMD too, and agree that YA should have more books like this!
ReplyDeleteFinally I see a good review for this book! I have only seen a few reviews for it, but they have all been negative, which surprised me because it sounded really interesting to me. I had taken it off of my TBR, but based on your review I may just have to put it back on!
ReplyDeleteThis book sound really good! great review!
ReplyDeleteGreat review! I always like a good mystery and it sounds like this one is not predictable. ~Pam
ReplyDeleteI agree that she didn't deal with her ex's death in a healthy way and she will eventually need to do so in order to move on and be happy with the new guy. Though, I get that she wasn't really into her previous relationship (because of obvious reasons) and was trying to find a way out. As heartless as it sounds, I think that his death was her final way out, but she just didn't know how to deal with that fact. Especially since her stalker is the one who "helped" her out. So, her starting up a new relationship so soon could have been just a way of dealing with it for her. She was finally free!
ReplyDeleteDid any of what I said make sense? Lol.
--Sam @ SIK Book Reviews