Don’t judge a book by its cover

When I picked up the girl who stopped swimming, I thought it was going to be one of those books in which a competitive athlete (in this case a swimmer) gets injured, and a the rest of the plot revolves around the girl’s emotional woes as she sits on the sidelines, watching her team go on without her.

This was not the case at all. I could tell that from the very first line—“Until the drowned girl came to Laurel’s bedroom, ghosts had never walked in Victorianna.” So if you expect a clichéd sports novel, you are not going to find it here. You will find the furthest thing from it.

Laurel Gray Hawthorne, a 32-year-old woman, wakes up to find her preteen daughter Shelby’s best friend standing over her. The ghost takes her to the window, where Laurel sees the ghost’s body floating facedown in her own backyard pool.  Any woman who finds a dead girl in her pool is suspicious, disturbed, and of course, just plain curious. So Laurel sets out to find why this little girl, Molly, is dead.

Laurel herself is a character not typically explored in teen novels, a suburban mom married to her college sweetheart who knocked her up at nineteen. Her sister Thalia, who Laurel reaches out to in this time of crisis, adds more intrigue—she runs a firehouse-converted-theatre with her gay husband, and won’t stop digging at the fact that Shelby, or her cousin Bet from the drug and poverty-ridden town of DeLop, might be involved in the death.

The narration flows easily and seamlessly between the present, a few years past, and Laurel and Thalia’s childhood, managing to explain why the sisters think the way they do and connecting the plot of the novel to their own pasts.

Twists fill the plot of the novel. These surprises throw readers off, like when a “suspect” (in Laurel’s eyes) of the murder turns out not to be the killer, but just your regular male prostitute who happens to have been lurking at the crime scene, or when the misinterpretation of an Ouija board leads to the near death of little Shelby.

This is more than your typical Southern murder-mystery. It focuses heavily on that, yes, but it’s also a novel about finding the past, realizing what is important to you, and facing your ghosts.

If you’re seeking a bouncy-happy story in which small problems are tidily solved and things are happily-ever-after in the end, look elsewhere. This is a complex book with a satisfying ending— not overly Disney-happy, and not purely grim either.

The Alchemyst surprises

It’s not Harry Potter. It’s not Eragon. It’s something in between both of these hit novels. It’s The Alchemyst.
The story of two teenagers learning that magic is real. Sound familiar? Yep, sort of like Harry Potter isn’t it? A boy who learns that magic is real, and he soon becomes a part of the magical world.
The Alchemyst by Michael Scott involves twins, Sophie and Josh Newman. They are starting their summers off with part-time jobs, and they work across the street from one another. How convenient.
Their bosses go by the names Nick and Perry Fleming, but soon havoc breaks loose and their true identities are revealed. Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel.
Before they know it Sophie and Josh are scooped up into a world of myths and legends. The twist is that instead of wands or dragons the story is based on actual people that existed.
Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel are said to actually have existed. Not only that but the Book of Abraham is also said to exist. This book is said to have the recipe for an elixir of ever-lasting life and riches.
It is said that the Flamels were able to decode and translate the book in order to create this potion.
In a nutshell it’s all pretty much a myth, but just the fact that there is the possibility of truth behind all of it is intriguing. Scott’s novel is all based off old myths and legends such as the Flamels. The only fiction is the plot line and the two main characters, Josh and Sophie.
If you are a fan of Harry Potter or any other novels such as Harry Potter, then The Alchemyst is a must read.