Book Review: The Cellar
I have been a reading fool the past few days. And I guess in honor of my blog being reopened--and revamped, I'll go ahead and do a small book review. Because after reading The Cellar by Natasha Preston, I have a lot to say.
Firstly, this genre isn't normally the type I read. The suspenseful, thrilling, creepy. I can't even binge watch Criminal Minds for too long before getting freaked out, how do I even begin to read books about kidnappings and other psycho stuff? However, I have been eyeing this book for the past few months. Seemed like every time I walked into Target, it was there... on the shelf... staring me down.
The back excerpt sucked me in every time. And finally I cracked.
I read this book in one day y'all. I started Saturday morning and finished in the evening. I couldn't put it down. I had to know how it ended. And I refuse to stoop to Gentry's level and read the ending before I actually finish. You can't see my face, but it's clearly unimpressed.
Moving on...
A very small synopsis of the book would be that a sixteen year old girl, Summer, gets abducted, thrown in a cellar with four other girls slightly older than herself, and given a new name--Lily. The three other girls all have flower names as well--Rose, Poppy, Violet. They are "taken care of" by their abductor, forced to live a sunless life in the cellar with duties like keeping themselves taken care of, showering twice a day, with clean clothes, nice make-up, making sure their living space is tidy, etc. He visits them twice a day, for breakfast and dinner, and they eat as a family. They are his family. Summer--now Lily--plays along, hoping that one day she can escape, or that her boyfriend and family will find her.
If I'm being perfectly honest, I have very mixed feelings about the book. While I was entertained by it because it was outside of my normal reading preference, I feel like it just had way too much going on. And when I say that, I just mean... I'll try to explain it without giving too much away, because I really encourage everyone to read it so you can form your own opinion!
Basically, for me, I think what it all boiled down to was too many points of views. Some books can get away with having multiple points of views, and some can't.
In the beginning we obviously get Summer's point of view as she's the protagonist, and then eventually we get a little bit from her boyfriend, Lewis's point of view. It is interesting, because we get to see how the world is taking her disappearance, and see how her family is going about looking for her. Personally, I think it could have been a little more mysterious if we'd only been with her on her journey--cut off from everything else.
And then, in a few rare chapters we get to experience this whole happening through the abductor's eyes--get in his mind. And I think that's where I have the majority of my issues. Only because, when the book was over, and the cover was closed, I still had so many questions. And maybe that was the whole point. Maybe that was the author's purpose--make us question what we just read. I just think I could have handled the lack of closure a little bit better if I'd only been in Summer's head the whole time. Having that small glimpse into the abductor's past, into his mind, and to see his reasoning behind what he was doing--but to not answer every question, or show everything about how he got to this dark place, it just wasn't satisfying enough.
It was like a tease, almost. Giving us just a little bit of what we wanted, but not the whole thing. I could accept that if it were just through Summer's eyes. But it wasn't.
Aside from having so many questions left when the book ended, I do have to say that there were a few points that I thought could have been more suspenseful. Like there were moments when you knew the book was supposed to have the hairs on the back of your neck standing up... and they just weren't. Like it was enough to keep you on edge, but not enough to actually scare you.
I feel like a lot of people out there are just reading this, going, "Man, she's really bashing this book". And I'm not! Or at least, I don't mean to. It was entertaining, and I enjoyed most of it. Hell, I read it in less than twenty-four hours! But there's positive and negative points to every book. I would definitely read other books by Natasha Preston. And I may even read this one again, maybe take my time and slow down, read it more carefully to see some things that I inevitably missed. Maybe I'll like it better the second time around.
Don't hate me for my lousy review this go around. I'll be reading more and reviewing more so when I come across a book that I am over the moon about, y'all will be the first to know!
About Lindsey
0 comments