Sunday, September 23, 2012

The Innocents (The Innocents # 1) by Lili Peloquin Review

Author: Lili Peloquin
Publisher: Razorbill
Release Date: October 16th, 2012
Format: ARC copy
Buy the book on Amazon
288 pages

Summary:
Nothing ever came between sisters Alice and Charlie.
Friends didn't.
Boys couldn't.
Their family falling apart never would.
Until they got to Serenity Point.
"The Innocents" is the first in a new series of young adult novels that weave a saga of nail-biting drama, breathless romance, and gothic mystery.

Goodreads

My Review:
 
I was pleasantly surprised by this book.  While I am usually not a fan of this particular type of contemporary YA, I found myself inexplicably drawn in by the drama, but more precisely by the mystery.  I was constantly wondering why so many strange facts were being uncovered and how everything was connected.
 

When two polar opposite sisters, Alice and Charlie, move to Serenity Point with their mother and her new husband Richard, they find themselves in a world with clearly established social cliques.  The outgoing Charlie quickly meets the two most popular kids on the island, Cybil and Jude, each of whom have their own troubled pasts.  Alice, however, stays more secluded, simply spending time by herself and having a private relationship with Tommy – the ex-boyfriend of Richard’s hauntingly beautiful dead daughter Camilla – whom she speaks with only at night under the cover of darkness.

This book was centered greatly on discovering things that happened in the past.  Charlie learns much about the histories of her two troubled friends: she learns to love Jude despite his faults and difficult nature, learning why he is the way he is, and she realizes with Cybil that it is good to keep your friends close and your enemies even closer.  Alice, on the other hand, becomes caught up in her mother’s relationship with Richard and, more importantly, Richard’s dead daughter Camilla, whom many mistake Alice for because of their similar appearances.  Most people on Serenity Point seem to remember Camilla as a wonderful and faultless young woman, but when Alice discovers that Camilla killed herself, she starts hunting through the past, realizing that Camilla’s life, which is inextricably bound to Alice’s, may not have been as perfect as it seemed.

While Alice’s passive behavior annoyed me, the sister’s fight at the end seemed forced, and the amount of secrets kept by each character seemed unnecessary, I still enjoyed reading this book.  The cliffhanger at the end of the book left me with many unanswered questions and I can’t wait for the sequel!  Overall, The Innocents was an interesting quick read that I would definitely recommend to fans of younger YA contemporaries with mystery.

My Rating:




1 comment:

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