3.5 stars A bit slow to start with. I usually prefer the first person narrative and this book is written in third person. This would have been ok but I found it a bit disjointed at places, especially when it kept changing from one person to the next.I couldn't understand why Val would refer to her parents as Mr & Mrs all the time, when mother, father would have been normal.There were few issues I had with this book, mainly her mother's response and "lack of action" when Val told her about the possibility and then the creepy emails from the stalker. Her mother's solution was to block this person and change the FB profile photo, the one posted being inappropriate... And later to go with her daughter's wishes to not press charges?!!! Val is a minor, as a parent you are responsible for your child's wellbeing, you do all is best for them. Picking up your daughter from a 18 year old's house (with no other adults in sight), and then deciding not to share this with your husband?!!! I find that very hard to believe. Being a parent myself, I found all these issues very disturbing and I have to blame her mother. My daughter is 11 years old, she has a mobile phone that she's been told to keep it switched on all the time, all her gadgets have parental control and the social networks she's signed up to (with age restrictions!) are constantly monitored.We have done so not because we don't trust her, but to stop any possible bullying ( which unfortunately have happened to one of her friends). So going back to the book, my initial reaction to Val's mum about the heart to heart about the stalker was that this can't be happening. Val came across as very naive, no that's not the right word, more like sheltered and not as street wise as her school friends. So to find out that your daughter is friends with an older boy (adult) it should ring all the alarm bells! A fourteen and a eighteen year old have nothing in common. Val has a father, but I felt his absence all throughout the book. When I started this book, at first I thought I noticed some supernatural elements in the story, the weather changes when Val was near Gavin. I thought he could control natural elements. And then I thought that there could be some kind of link with Val's love of pets, personally I thought she was too old to still be so obsessive with them. At one point in the story she thought Gavin's hair resembled animal fur, and that only reinforced my imagination that he might be some shapeshifter especially when he started throwing the wolf and deer analogies.I can tell you that while reading this book I had few suspicions and theories, special powers, shapeshifter(admittedly this one wasn't very strong), maybe he was someone incarnate, but the strongest was that Gavin was a psycho. Having now finished the first book I can't wait to start the next one. Somehow I still think (and hoping) that there's some connection to the animals, and that we'll get some answers about Gavin's family, his mysterious father and why do I get the feeling that Val's parents might not be be her real ones?So overall this was a good book, not as dark as I was expecting and I really hope that the next one will have some kind of mystery and not just a cat and mouse chase game.
Ellelou's Book Corner
3.5 stars A bit slow to start with. I usually prefer the first person narrative and this book is written in third person. This would have been ok but I found it a bit disjointed at places, especially when it kept changing from one person to the next.I couldn't understand why Val would refer to her parents as Mr & Mrs all the time, when mother, father would have been normal.There were few issues I had with this book, mainly her mother's response and "lack of action" when Val told her about the possibility and then the creepy emails from the stalker. Her mother's solution was to block this person and change the FB profile photo, the one posted being inappropriate... And later to go with her daughter's wishes to not press charges?!!! Val is a minor, as a parent you are responsible for your child's wellbeing, you do all is best for them. Picking up your daughter from a 18 year old's house (with no other adults in sight), and then deciding not to share this with your husband?!!! I find that very hard to believe. Being a parent myself, I found all these issues very disturbing and I have to blame her mother. My daughter is 11 years old, she has a mobile phone that she's been told to keep it switched on all the time, all her gadgets have parental control and the social networks she's signed up to (with age restrictions!) are constantly monitored.We have done so not because we don't trust her, but to stop any possible bullying ( which unfortunately have happened to one of her friends). So going back to the book, my initial reaction to Val's mum about the heart to heart about the stalker was that this can't be happening. Val came across as very naive, no that's not the right word, more like sheltered and not as street wise as her school friends. So to find out that your daughter is friends with an older boy (adult) it should ring all the alarm bells! A fourteen and a eighteen year old have nothing in common. Val has a father, but I felt his absence all throughout the book. When I started this book, at first I thought I noticed some supernatural elements in the story, the weather changes when Val was near Gavin. I thought he could control natural elements. And then I thought that there could be some kind of link with Val's love of pets, personally I thought she was too old to still be so obsessive with them. At one point in the story she thought Gavin's hair resembled animal fur, and that only reinforced my imagination that he might be some shapeshifter especially when he started throwing the wolf and deer analogies.I can tell you that while reading this book I had few suspicions and theories, special powers, shapeshifter(admittedly this one wasn't very strong), maybe he was someone incarnate, but the strongest was that Gavin was a psycho. Having now finished the first book I can't wait to start the next one. Somehow I still think (and hoping) that there's some connection to the animals, and that we'll get some answers about Gavin's family, his mysterious father and why do I get the feeling that Val's parents might not be be her real ones?So overall this was a good book, not as dark as I was expecting and I really hope that the next one will have some kind of mystery and not just a cat and mouse chase game.
 - Nenia Campbell)
