Another Little Piece by Kate Karyus Quinn
Release Date – June 11, 2013
Publisher Website - Harper Collins
Publisher Social Media - Twitter/Facebook/SavvyReader
Pages - 432 pages
My Rating- 3/5
**obtained for review from publisher**
Here is the Goodreads synopsis
The spine-tingling horror of Stephen King meets an eerie mystery worthy of Sara Shepard's Pretty Little Liars series in Kate Karyus Quinn's haunting debut.Another Little Piece will totally mess with your head. Its dark, gory, and eerie. A story in which your main character is not what they seem, and twisted is only the beginning.
On a cool autumn night, Annaliese Rose Gordon stumbled out of the woods and into a high school party. She was screaming. Drenched in blood. Then she vanished.
A year later, Annaliese is found wandering down a road hundreds of miles away. She doesn't know who she is. She doesn't know how she got there. She only knows one thing: She is not the real Annaliese Rose Gordon.
Now Annaliese is haunted by strange visions and broken memories. Memories of a reckless, desperate wish . . . a bloody razor . . . and the faces of other girls who disappeared. Piece by piece, Annaliese's fractured memories come together to reveal a violent, endless cycle that she will never escape—unless she can unlock the twisted secrets of her past.
From the synopsis I wasn't sure what exactly to expect. I thought it might be a thriller/mystery. It's paranormal novel in every sense. It's atmosphere, and style make it clear that it's also very much a horror infused one as well.
The entire idea of this novel is quite different from anything I've ever read. I've seen it compared to Stephen King and I can see where it came from. It's an ambitious plot and the way it's written builds on itself rather nicely. It's revealed slowly, and in a way that creates suspense. However, it also makes it rather jumbled. Flashbacks and 'visions' are used intermittently throughout the story, and often no clear indication is given. It ends up coming together in the end, but it's not has cohesive as it could be.
So much of what makes this novel work is a spoiler. I won't be giving too much away, but it's the reveal that makes the story fit, and provides the much needed pay off. Once you know how, and why everything is happening the rest of the story makes sense. It's like a puzzle where one piece suddenly makes the picture clear. It's an imaginative, unique story that did have some flair to it. I wish it has been explained a little more, delved a little deeper, especially into the backstory of the character who started it all.
The main character is the most developed, and surprisingly the only one to get any sort of development. This version of Annaliese grows and changes throughout the novel. I came to care about the eventual outcome of this Anna who was paying for sins for greater than she could remember. This is perhaps the best accomplishment of this story. It's main character has done terrible things, and yet I wanted redemption and release for her. I wanted her to find peace.
Those who like their novels filled with twisted chills, and plentiful gore will most likely love this one. I like the neat way it all tied together in the end, but ultimately wished for a little more backstory, and a little more character development from the secondary characters.
I had such high hopes for this because lots of people kept urging me to read it. I was left with more questions than answers and that ending just left things open. I agree with your review.
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