Deadly Little Lies by Laurie Faria Stolarz

I have to call this one another low 3 star rating as well. This will be a short review simply because I don’t have much to say.

My problem with this book, and likely with the first, is the repetition. It seems like nothing really happens beyond, bad day at school, go to Knead to work out her frustrations (even though she’s not actually scheduled to work- which she never seems to be), some kind of scary event (strange noises, banging doors etc) followed by Ben mysteriously showing up, intense moment, Ben leaves, meet with Ben to say “goodbye” for the 1000th time… etc etc etc. It doesn’t feel like anything really ever happens beyond constantly waiting for something to happen. It’s frustrating because the book and the story line have a lot of potential.

And yet, even with the repetition, I was still intrigued enough to keep reading and finish the book fairly quickly. I will continue with the series when the third is released because I was intrigued by the end of this installment. I want to know what happens to these characters... although I can’t for the life of me figure out why.

My TBR Pile

I haven’t been able to do a lot of reading in the past week and a bit- actually I’ve done a ton of reading, but it was for school so that doesn’t count- and I’m falling way behind on my TBR pile. I thought I'd do a post about what’s coming up because I’m excited to get to them.

Right now I’m about 100 pages into Through the Fire by Shawn Grady. I won this book on GoodReads ages ago (I think back in November) but I didn’t actually receive it until the end of March. I’m finally getting around to reading it now. It’s ok so far. I’m about 100 pages in and it hasn’t grabbed me yet, but it’s not bad.

Next-up… Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins! My friend Crystal over at Crystal Clear Reading had an awesome giveaway for a signed copy of this much talked about book… and I won! I originally planned to put down Through the Fire and spend a night flying through Hex Hall, but the guilt got to me and I decided to wait and finish one before I pickup another. I can’t wait though!

Also sitting waiting patiently for me is Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green. I have mixed feelings about this book. I had no desire to read it for the longest time until I discovered vlogbrothers and thought “I have to read anything and everything John Green has ever written” and immediately ordered my own copy of WGWG. I anxiously awaited its arrival and squee’d when it hit my mailbox… and it’s still sitting there. My husband even picked it up and read it (and loved it) but for some reason, I just haven’t felt like starting it. Strange right? So, I’ve decided for sure that it will follow Hex Hall.

Counting the books I have on hold at the library along with the stacks of unread books on my shelves at home, the last thing I needed to do was place a Book Depository order. But I did. Because my birthday is coming up and so I made my husband pay for the order as my birthday gift

On there way to my house as we speak are:

Deadly Little Lies by Laurie Faria Stolarz- the sequel to Deadly Little Secret. Although I thought the first was just “good” I wanted to continue with the series to find out what happens.

The Line by Teri Hall- I LOVE dystopian novels (think Hunger Games, The Giver, Unwind etc) so I’ve been dying to get my hands on this book. Unfortunately, my library doesn’t have a copy, nor do the have intentions to get a copy. So I finally broke down and ordered it.

I also pre-ordered:

Sisters Red by Jackson Pearce- I don’t know what it is about this book, but I’m dying to read it.

Linger by Maggie Stiefvater- I really enjoyed Shiver and have heard raves about the Linger ARC’s being passed around so I’m pretty excited about this one too.

So that’s it. With our plans cancelled for this coming long-weekend, I’m taking the Friday off any way to get caught up with school (yes… I’m already behind). So hopefully that will leave 3 days where I can get through a couple of these books. Can’t wait!

Deadly Little Secret by Laurie Faria Stolarz

This is a low 3 star rating. The story was interesting overall, but it was lacking somehow. I think this was meant for a somewhat younger YA audience. There's very little detail or character development and I think that's what makes it hard to love the story.

I did enjoy it though, and I found it to be a very quick read. I wish the author would have gone a little deeper because I think it could have been a really engaging story. Perhaps this is just not one of those YA books meant to be enjoyed by an older crowd.

I think another issue that bothered me was the similarities to a certain 4 installment YA Vampire series. Now, I have to admit that I am the first person to get angry when every book under the sun is compared to Twilight, but I have to say with this one, some of the commonalities were difficult to overlook.

All in all, this book was just good. I will continue with the series to see what happens, but I'm not in a rush and will likely wait for the paperback to come out.