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The Shadows
The Shadows
Alex North | 2020 | Thriller
9
9.0 (3 Ratings)
Book Rating
I was provided with a complimentary copy of this book so I could give an honest review. The opinions are entirely my own, and any quotes are taken from the ARC and may be different in the final published copy.

While I have "read" audiobooks for years now, this is the first one I was given to review. Let me catch my breath before starting. Wow! OK. Wow! That needed to be said.

Alex North's "debut" novel, The Whisper Man, was a 2019 Goodreads Choice Award Nominee for Mystery & Thriller. When I finished reading it, I immediately added his second book, The Shadows, to my must-read list.

The narrators of The Shadows are Hannah Arterton and John Heffernan. The combination of North's writing and Arterton and Heffernan's narration provides a story that feels as if the narrators are the characters themselves, sitting by a fire, retelling North's story, and not merely reading the story. It is their narration that helps North bring the listener down the rabbit hole and ending up questioning everything they thought was true. I needed to reread sections to see how I could have gotten everything so wrong.

North is a British crime writer who has previously published under another name. According to Goodreads, this is Arterton's first narration. While Heffernan has narrated a few novels, he writes mostly for film and TV but also wrote Driver For The Dead, his first comic book series.

This 200-word review was published on Philomathinphila.com on 7/14/20 and updated on 8/24/20.
  
174 of 235
Kindle
The First Satan ( The A’vean Chronicles 0.5)
By G.R. Thomas
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

At the dawn of civilisation, angels roamed the Earth.
Within shadows and dreams, these great warriors of A’vean were the silent caretakers of humanity, watching the first civilisations pull themselves from the cesspit of evolution.
I’el, the creator of all things, set one directive… Do not interfere.
Yeqon, sentenced to Earth as punishment for his misdeeds elsewhere, resented this deployment. Mindless eons of gently nudging humanity in the right direction set his mind to wander on the past and future glory, of war and power. Cowering in the shadows at the behest of I'el set a flame of resentment alight within him.
Yet, a loyal warrior, Yeqon remained committed to the task when he yearned to travel the universe, to fight, to love... until I'el pushed that loyalty too far.
A cord was struck against Yeqon and the Watchers he commanded, an event so devastating that it cleaved a wedge through them and stoked that fire. This upheaval stirred the beginnings of the greatest of wars...
and birthed the First Satan.

I can’t fault this book! I loved it! Yeqon is such a complex character and I really enjoyed finding out more about him. This is such a fascinating world and this author creates really in-depth characters.
I was lucky to have this gifted to me from the author and I’m so glad to have been chosen. Definitely read this if you love the series.
  
TS
The Shadow Keepers
8
8.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
220 of 230
Kindle
The Shadow Keeper
By Marisa Noelle
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Sixteen-year-old Georgia Boone has seen the shadow creatures in mirrors and other reflective surfaces since she was six-years-old. But no one--not even her
brother, the person she’s closest to in the entire world--believes her. She is all alone in the hellish world where crow-like creatures hunt her everywhere she goes

When an afternoon of shopping ends in violence and blood, Georgia is sent to the UK’s most prestigious mental health hospital: Brookwood Hospital.
There, she’s forced to face her fears and answer the question:

Are the shadows real, or is this all in her head?

At Brookwood, the shadow creatures are more present than ever. Each day they grow stronger. With the help of a mysterious boy who lives inside the mirror world, she might be able to prove that she’s not hallucinating and stop the shadows from destroying the human world.

I’ve seen a lot from this author on social media and was really looking forward to reading her work. I was not disappointed this is a great YA with some sensitive issues that in my opinion were dealt with very very well. I could relate to a lot in this book from my teenage years to now. It was such an interesting concept and I’m glad it went the way it did it’s nice to see that people with mental health issues can face our demons and win sometimes whether they are real or not!
  
BI
Buried in a Bog (County Cork, #1)
4
4.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Maura Donovan is fulfilling a promise to her Gran and visiting the part of Ireland where the family originated. However, her time of discovering family history is interrupted by two bodies – one dredged up from a bog and one more modern victim.

Sadly, the mystery takes a back, back seat to the story of Maura learning family history and discovering the part of Ireland. The author obviously loves the area and brings it to vivid life, but it over shadows the mystery, which takes a back seat. The characters were enjoyable, but not enough to make me long for a repeat visit to County Cork.

Read my full review at <a href="http://carstairsconsiders.blogspot.com/2015/03/book-review-buried-in-bog-by-sheila.html">Carstairs Considers</a>.
  
Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
Shadow of a Doubt (1943)
1943 | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
6
6.7 (3 Ratings)
Movie Rating
Does Alfred Hitchcock do anything else?
Right now, I'm in a film class for school and it's all about Alfred Hitchcock. We're watching most of his collected works and honestly, I feel like once you've seen one, you've seen them all. It's clear through his films that he's very into murder and murder mysteries and thrillers. He likes stairs and birds and shadows. He's batshit about symbolism and irony and cyclical plots, something always turns back around.

This is my fourth or maybe fifth Hitchcock film and I don't know how I am supposed to continue to watch them. I feel like I'm watching a bad show that should've ended seasons ago but hasn't had the guts to call it quits yet. It's so disappointing!