Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Cruelty Can Be Beautiful (book review)

courtesy of Barns & Noble
You look at the cover of this book and you think "seems like it could be a good suspense book." And to no avail, it is a ghost story. Shall you read or shall you leave this one behind?

Written in third person by Kate Cann, this YA novel takes place in London focused on the view of a 16 year old girl named Rayne. Rayne deals with an alcoholic mother, a little brother, and a possessive boyfriend.

Summer heat is insufferable and Rayne is suffering from the heat outside and inside her home. With her mother, she is always held responsible to take care of her brother while her mother goes out partying with her boyfriend. With her own boyfriend, Rayne feels lucky but finds herself cornered at times. Rayne wants to get away from her usual life so she goes and looks for a job. She gets one at an Estate far from her home in order to get away from her usual life; only to find out she is gotten herself into an adventure she didn't expect.

The book was alright if I was 13 and was easily scared by little details in books like "a creaking door" or "red-eyed self portrait" of some dame back in the victorian era. But certainly I am not. As Rayne explores the different creepy rooms of the Estate she is working on, I found myself still looking for the "scary" part of the book. The bad guys are just laughable and the main attraction of the book is a particular scene that involves her possessive boyfriend.

Cann did good in writing a main character who isn't your usual archetype. Rayne is more realistic in the aspect of how she reacts emotionally with people. But the dialogue was a bit cliche. The ending was rather weird to me in the way it was written so far in the aesthetics of the book. To conclude this review, I was disappointed to find that the ghost story part of this book wasn't fulfilling as it should be. If you're going to pick up this book just to give it a chance despite this review; I will suggest to not expect much of a creepy ghost story. Otherwise...

Til Next Blogpost,
Miss Bobo

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