Completed Book Challenge 2014

Another year, done and dusted! Here are the new books that I have made it through this year. I managed some rereads in between, but I cannot count those again. It was most enjoyable. Thanks to all who gave me recommendations that I got to, it was lovely!

1. The Fault In Our Stars – John Green

2. The Perfect Husband (FBI Profiler Series – Quincy #1) – Lisa Gardner

3. Sworn to Silence (Kate Burkholder #1) – Linda Castillo

4. One False Move – Alex Kava

5. Windmills of the Gods – Sidney Sheldon

6. Night Shift – Stephen King

7. The Third Victim (FBI Profiler Series – Quincy #2) – Lisa Gardner

8. The Goldfinch – Donna Tartt

9. Unseen (Georgia #5) – Karin Slaughter

10. Gone Girl – Gillian Flynn

11. Pray for Silence (Kate Burkholder #2) – Linda Castillo

12. The Gunslinger (The Dark Tower #1) – Stephen King

13. Horns – Joe Hill

14. The Perks of Being a Wallflower – Stephen Chbosky

15. An Abundance of Katherines – John Green

16. Mailman: A Novel – J Robert Lennon

17. Whitewash – Alex Kava

18. Shutter Island – Dennis Lehane

19. The Rolling Stones: 50 – Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Charlie Watts, and Ronnie Wood

20. Fight Club – Chuck Palahniuk

21. Will Grayson, Will Grayson – John Green & David Levithan

22. Drive – James Sallis

23. Looking for Alaska – John Green

24. Are You Afraid of the Dark? – Sidney Sheldon

25. The Silence of the Lambs (Hannibal Lecter #2) – Thomas Harris

26. Under the Knife – Tess Gerritsen

27. A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire #1) – George R.R. Martin

28. Dracula – Bram Stoker

29. Dead Until Dark (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #1) – Charlaine Harris

30. Tell Me Your Dreams – Sidney Sheldon

 

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That was the original challenge. I finished all of those and then decided to up it to fifty.

31. Living Dead in Dallas (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #2) – Charlaine Harris

32. Paper Towns – John Green

33. Club Dead (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #3) – Charlaine Harris

34. One Scream Away (Sheridan #1) – Kate Brady

35. Dead to the World (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #4) – Charlaine Harris

36. Warm Bodies (Warm Bodies #1) – Isaac Marion

37. Dead as a Doornail (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #5) – Charlaine Harris

38. Heart-Shaped Box – Joe Hill

39. Definitely Dead (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #6) – Charlaine Harris

40. To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee

41. All Together Dead (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #7) – Charlaine Harris

42. Cop Town – Karin Slaughter

43. From Dead to Worse (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #8) – Charlaine Harris

44. The Bad Place – Dean Koontz

45. Dead and Gone (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #9) – Charlaine Harris

46. A Drink Before The War (Kenzie & Gennaro #1) – Dennis Lehane

47. Dead in the Family (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #10) – Charlaine Harris

48. The Villa – Nora Roberts

49. Dead Reckoning (The Southern Vampire Mysteries / Sookie Stackhouse #11) – Charlaine Harris

50. Darkness, Take My Hand (Kenzie & Gennaro #1) – Dennis Lehane

Well, there we have it folks. I know I have some recommendations that were given to me, they are on my list, they will most likely make the new year’s challenge 🙂 Thanks so much to everyone who read, commented and recommended, it is much appreciated!

Review: One Scream Away – Kate Brady

Sheridan #1

Beth Denison works with antiques and has a terrifying past, a secret she has buried and kept that way for seven years. She lives with her daughter, Abby, and has dedicated her whole life to protecting her baby, to keep them safe. Independent, strong, intelligent, Beth has built the perfect little idyllic life up for them, and is intent on doing anything and everything in her power to keep it that way. However, the threads of her world start to come loose when she gets a call from Chevy Bankes, the dark blot on her past, taunting her. She skips into fear mode, and starts on her contingency plans. Lieutenant Rick Sacowicz goes to see ex-FBI agent Neil Sheridan, to plead with the man to help him out with a case, one that has ties that could possibly reconnect to the case that crippled Sheridan’s world. He is bitter, sour, angry, but ultimately relents. Anthony Russell was killed years ago while investigating the brutal murder of Gloria Michaels, and it was Neil that did it.

However, Rick’s newest corpse has way too many similarities with the Michaels case to be coincidence, and he pulls Sheridan back into the fold, though Sheridan is not pleased. If Sheridan got the wrong guy, it means that there is a dangerous and sick man on the loose. The pair head off to meet with Beth Denison, who got a call on the night Rick’s victim was murdered – from the victim’s cellphone. Beth pleads a crank call, but Sheridan doesn’t buy it for a moment. Beth is tense, angry, and afraid of something, though she’d be damned to tell the police. Sheridan keeps an eye on her, and when Beth receives a second call off a second victim’s cell, Sheridan and Rick know that she is hiding something, be it that she is in love with the killer or being stalked. Sheridan feels extreme attraction to Beth, and she to him, though goodness knows they are both damaged goods.

The more that Sheridan pushes Beth for information, the less she gives forth, though it is evident she is desperate to protect Abby. Chevy Bankes, meanwhile, is making a bloody trek cross the country to finally see Beth. Out of prison for a while now, Bankes has prepared the perfect game to play with her. Beth will not share a stitch of her past with the people who can help her, and Bankes is having way too much fun pulling at her heart strings and taunting her relentlessly, counting on Beth to hold her tongue. Beth and Sheridan are becoming more entwined with one another, and Bankes draws closer.

What happened between Beth and Bankes? Why does he want her so badly? Will Beth and Sheridan be able to let go and move on from their respective paths? Will Beth ever let someone else help her, someone else bear the burden and protect Abby? Will mother and daughter survive the ordeal? Did Sheridan kill the wrong man all those years ago?

Well… this was… alright I suppose. I read this for a colleague who picked it up at the second hand bookstore across the street from our offices. Because I read so much, she figured I may as well read it and let her know if it is worth her spending time on, seeing as she does not read that much. I figured why not, I hadn’t read anything from Kate Brady before. I guess this was alright. There was so much love at first site and attraction and what not from the off almost, and it wasn’t explained very well, and was just shady. I mean it came out of nowhere, and was not put together very well. Then (and this worked on my last nerve) there was so much alluding to the past and all, but shrouding it under extreme mystery – not something I mind, I like that, but when it is every damned few lines then you just need to come out with it, or stop hinting at it or blantantly put it out there. Usually that ends up with this huge build up and an extremely disappointing payoff. Which is exactly what happened here. For just over a third of the book, Brady keeps yakking about the past without ever really saying anything, so nothing is  really happening. Then the beans are spilled, and they are incredibly unsatisfactory when they come. I honestly thought (at the rate she was going) all the secrecy was covering up something worse. Not saying this wasn’t bad, but I mean really. Also, the one thing that was supposed to be a big whoa moment in this book fell flat because you already saw it coming a mile off. Then there is the fact that there is absolutely no character developments, and no characters you can actually identify with, which leads to more frustration. This lust suddenly hopped into a relationship really ungracefully, and left a lot to be desired. The book is a very simple read, which is one of the few things that it has going for it. Brady doesn’t really write fantastically, either. Not that she is bad, just average. One Scream Away was a mediocre experience overall. Definitely not something I will be going back to again.