I really did not like this book very much. At the same time, it is clear I am really not the intended audience for this book. Man, I really hate writing reviews like this, because while I didn’t like it, I can see that someone else probably would, especially someone younger, and this being a YA book, that makes total sense. So, I’m prefacing this with the disclaimer that I am a Cranky Old and so if you are not a Cranky Old, take this review with a grain of salt. There is good stuff in this book, it just didn’t add up to a satisfying whole for me personally.
This book follows two different timelines, both taking place 80 years apart at the very exclusive Ellingham Academy, and alternative education academy where learning is viewed as a “game.” The first follows the night the wife and daughter of the school’s founder were kidnapped by someone calling themselves “Truly Devious.” The second follows Stevie Bell, a first year student with an interest in forensics and a passion for figuring out what really happened to Lily and Alice Ellingham while still keeping up with her studies. That won’t be easy, especially when it starts to look like Truly Devious has managed to return, and is after the students this time.
OK, so, I’ll start with the good. The weaving of the timelines is done really well, and does a great job of helping to propel the story. I also really like the supporting characters here, it’s a good, diverse group, which is great to see and makes the overall feel way more interesting. Her friends are real people, not just Exposition Objects, which would be an easy trap to fall into on a book like this. There is a little bit of a Breakfast Club-ish “the gamer, the inventor, the actor, the writer, the kookie artist, etc.” thing there, but not in a way that is off putting. It also makes for a good romantic side plot between Stevie and a fellow student. I really like that Stevie is a person with some major flaws, not to make her a bad person, obviously, but she has things to work through and overcome. I also kind of like how the author is pretty blunt about dealing with the truth that cold cases are fun and titillating, they are puzzles to be solved; but it’s a whole other thing to actually see what happens when a person has been killed. It’s not nearly as exciting and adventurous as you think it would be when people are hurt in real time around you.
The not as good, at least from my perspective. This is book one of a trilogy. There really just is not a big enough story here for three books. Had this been a stand alone and everything wrapped up at the end of this one book then maybe it could have worked for me, but there is just way too much dragging out of things to make it last (what I’m guessing will be) most of Stevie’s two years at the school. I’m also not a fan of the whole “no one has figured this out in 80 years, but they hadn’t met this 15-year-old!” thing. I think that’s me being old and cranky, but for that to work for me it needs to be pretty much flawless.
I was also a little annoyed with how certain wells were drawn from a little too often. It’s one of those things that is realistic in real life, but gets a little tedious in fiction. For example, Stevie’s relationship with her parents is complicated for good reasons, but those same reasons are rehashed more often than necessary for us to get it, same with certain attributes of some of her classmates. It is possible that these constant references will lead to a pay off of some kind down the road in the later books, but it would have to be one hell of a pay off to make it worth it.
I wish I could get more into this series, but I just couldn’t.