Maddie Fynn is a shy high school junior, cursed with an eerie intuitive ability: she sees a series of unique digits hovering above the foreheads of each person she encounters. Her earliest memories are marked by these numbers, but it takes her father’s premature death for Maddie and her family to realize that these mysterious digits are actually death dates, and just like birthdays, everyone has one.
Forced by her alcoholic mother to use her ability to make extra money, Maddie identifies the quickly approaching death date of one client's young son, but because her ability only allows her to see the when and not the how, she’s unable to offer any more insight. When the boy goes missing on that exact date, law enforcement turns to Maddie.
Soon, Maddie is entangled in a homicide investigation, and more young people disappear and are later found murdered. A suspect for the investigation, a target for the murderer, and attracting the attentions of a mysterious young admirer who may be connected to it all, Maddie's whole existence is about to be turned upside down. Can she right things before it's too late?
I don’t even know where to begin with this review because
all I want to do is gush over Victoria Laurie and talk about how much I love
her writing. I discovered Victoria Laurie’s books years ago. She has a psychic
series and a ghost hunter series that I fell in love with.
Now, I’m not a huge young adult fan. But since this was
Victoria Laurie, I had to give WHEN a
chance. Like I already said, I’ve been a fan for a long time and had high hopes
when I saw she had written a young adult novel. Let me tell you, I read the
whole thing in one sitting. Victoria did NOT disappoint! I was wrapped up in
the story right from the beginning.
We start off meeting 16 year-old Maddie, who has a special
gift. She can tell you your death date. She doesn’t know why or how she can see
people’s death dates and after she wasn’t able to save her father, she doesn’t
believe she can do anything to prevent someone’s death date either.
After a mother whose son is missing comes to see Maddie,
things start having a horrible domino effect for her. Everything Maddie tries
to do to help ends up backfiring on her, as well as her best friend Stubby.
I’m familiar with Victoria Laurie writing older characters,
so I was happily surprised with how amazing her dialog was for high school
students. She nailed it! The dialog and character development were so spot on
and believable that it had me feeling everything Maddie was feeling while I
read the book. I just wanted to swoop in and take her home and help her.
I really love a good mystery and who-done-it. While WHEN had a subtle romance element in it,
I should warn you this definitely isn’t a romance novel. It’s a suspense
thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat while screaming about all
the injustice done to Maddie at your kindle.
Victoria Laurie wrote the mystery intrigue in WHEN like a puzzle that you find all of
the pieces to in the scavenger hunt of reading through the book. Only you can’t
exactly put them all together until you get to the end.
As a professional psychic, Victoria's protagonists - psychic Abigail Cooper, and spiritual medium M. J. Holliday - tackle the tricky world of the paranormal while fighting bad guys and demons with plenty of plucky humor and determination.
And using that keen understanding of the paranormal, Victoria also created the character of Maddie Fynn, a teenager with the unique intuitive ability to predict the exact date of someone's death.
To showcase her writing range, Victoria has also penned a children's epic adventure series, The Oracles of Delphi Keep.
Victoria loves to connect with her fans, and you can find her on Facebook.
Um...I don`t think so.
ReplyDeleteNo!
ReplyDeleteNo, probably not...
ReplyDeleteyes I would
ReplyDelete