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3.04 AVERAGE
3.04 AVERAGE
I found this to be an okay book. Slightly boring at times but somewhat enjoyable. Was a bit disappointed about the whole cult angle, was expecting something more.
Your Life Is Mine is about Blanche Potter, the daughter of cult leader Chuck Varner. When Blanche was ten, Chuck committed a mass shooting in a local mall to "spread his message", and then killed himself, leaving Blanche alone with her mother Crissy. Groomed to become the next 'Chuck' by her parents, Blanche instead leaves town when she turns eighteen, and goes on to become a successful documentary filmmaker. When her mother is murdered, Blanche returns to the 'scene of the crime', worried that Chuck's particular brand of evil is rising again.
There were a few things I didn't like about this book. For one thing, I found it extremely difficult to 'get into'. I just couldn't find a way IN. It was like there was a brick wall between me and the characters. None of them appealed to me - even Blanche, the ostensible 'heroine'. She didn't ring true, and I couldn't get my head around her relationship with Jaya, her supposed best friend. Jaya mainly shows up so they can have odd sexual tension and/or so she can yell at her for being irresponsible / keeping secrets.
None of the twists felt much like 'twists', besides one bombshell toward the end, and I just couldn't find any pleasure in this tale. It was joyless. I'm sure others will feel differently, and certainly I really liked Nathan Ripley's first novel, so let's hope this was just the sophomore curse.
Blanche Potter’s father was Chuck Varner, the notorious cult leader who after shooting several people at a mall right in front of his 7 year old daughter, ends his own life.
Years have passed since that incident and Blanche has built a new life for herself. A life in which her deranged father and mother don’t exist. A new start. A new city. A new name.
Until she is approached by a journalist who claims he knows who she is and wants to make a documentary about her and her father. Moreover, he informs Blanche that her estranged mother has been shot to death in her trailer house.
Blanche has to go back to her hometown, to make sure if her mother is really dead and to figure out who killed her and why.
Thanks to the author, Atria Books and the NetGalley for providing me with a copy.
The first few chapters were interesting, but as I read further I couldn’t take the characters and the cult seriously. Blanche’s father seemed more petty than as a charismatic leader. Many of the characters revealed their true motives too soon and to only their detriment. This had a good start and could have gone somewhere and I felt like it didn’t have much of a story. It starts with the shooter acting irrationally and then follows his successor who doesn’t appear to achieve anything.
I want to thank Atria Books, Netgalley and the author for my honest opinion. 2/5 stars.
Get Smitten For Fiction! 😸
Hello fellow book lovers! I'm back with an impressive book for you to check out this summer. Your Life Is Mine by Canadian author Nathan Ripley comes out June 4th and I tell ya, this was a wild ride. I received an ARC from Netgalley and I can't wait to tell you why I'm SMITTEN with this fierce novel.
About The Book 📚
Title: Your Life Is Mine
Author: Nathan Ripley
Publication Date: June 4, 2019
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Format/Pages: e-book ARC 304 pages
Goodreads Link
Pre-Order on Amazon.com
Pre-Order on Chapters Indigo
I gave Ripley's début novel, Find You In the Dark, 3 stars. It was pretty good, but the pace was sluggish and I found the characters a little stale. Neither is the case for his second novel, Your Life Is Mine. I LOVED this book so much, and Ripley has solidified his spot on my auto-read list.
› Setting
August 17, 1966, Stilford, California, Cult leader Chuck Varner brings his seven-year-old daughter to a mall and has her watch him go on a killing spree, then turned the gun on himself.
"Before a shooter is a shooter, he's just a man in a room."
› Plot & Characters
• Blanche: 20 years after her father went on a killing spree, Blanche is in New Orleans, shooting a historical true crime documentary. As a child, she experienced a horrifying event that changed her forever. As a young woman, she's left her mother and dark history behind. She finds out her mother was murdered and returns to her hometown to find out what happened. She's convinced that her father's cult is going strong and another killing spree will happen again soon.
• Jaya: as a teen, Blanche moved in with Jaya and her parents. Jaya and Blanche are a tight-knit team, they are best friends and work together making documentaries.
• Emil: shows up just as Blanche, Jaya, and their crew is wrapping production. He tells Blanche that he knows who she really is, and is blackmailing her to hear what he has to say or he's going to spill the beans to the press.
• Chuck Varner: Blanche's biological father, cult leader, murderer. He believed chaos and violence were natural.
• Crissy Varner: adored and supported Blanche's father, Chuck. She continued to believe in his vision, even after he took his own life, until she's found murdered.
• The Boy: he's referred to as the one who would come after, he teamed up with Crissy and believes in Chuck's vision for violence and chaos.
"We followed his code. The code he called Your Life Is Mine."
› Writing Style
• I love Ripley's writing style, in particular the way Blanche's childhood trauma is told in flashbacks throughout the story.
• The morally gray characters are complicated, baffling, riveting and realistic. No person is simply good or evil, we all make our choices in that moment, for that situation. Do you like morally grey characters? Here's a list of books you might like: https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/morally-grey-characters
• LGBT rep? I'm not 100% sure, but did anyone else get the feeling that Jaya and Blanche have had, or could have a romantic relationship?
› Themes
• Your Life Is Mine drives home the value of information, and how that knowledge can be used to dig up the truth. This is a story about a young girl who overcame the odds to become a successful woman, but who isn't done growing until she can deal with her guilt and trauma.
› Likes 😻
• When I learned what this book was about I was incredibly worried that it would glorify mass murderers, but I'm glad to report it does not do that. Instead, this story shows the impact that a shooting spree has, not just on the victims and their families, but also the lasting negative impact on the family of the shooter.
› Final Thoughts
• Your Life Is Mine is an engaging, intense, creepy novel that is one of the best thrillers I've ever read.
Thank you to Netgalley and publisher for the complimentary copy in exchange for my honest review.
*Quotes taken from an ARC copy and subject to change*
"Nathan Ripley is the pseudonym of Toronto resident and Journey Prize winner Naben Ruthnum. Find You in the Dark, Ripley’s first thriller, was an instant bestseller and an Arthur Ellis Awards finalist for Best First Novel. As Naben Ruthnum, he is the author of Curry: Eating, Reading, and Race. Follow him on Twitter @NabenRuthnum."
https://www.simonandschuster.ca/authors/Nathan-Ripley/2141394714
https://twitter.com/nabenruthnum/
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