Published: December 2010 by Henry Holt and Co.
Format: Hardback, 213 pages
First Reviewed: February 2011
Buy: Barnes & Noble//Books-A-Million//Amazon//Book Depository
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Please, please, just let me go. I won't tell anyone.
Sixteen year-old Cheyenne Wilder is sleeping in the back of a car while her mom fills her prescription at the pharmacy. Before Cheyenne realizes what's happening, their car is being stolen—with her inside! Griffin hadn’t meant to kidnap Cheyenne, all he needed to do was steal a car for the others. But once Griffin's dad finds out that Cheyenne’s father is the president of a powerful corporation, everything changes—now there’s a reason to keep her. What Griffin doesn’t know is that Cheyenne is not only sick with pneumonia, she is blind. How will Cheyenne survive this nightmare, and if she does, at what price?
Rating: 2/5
For a very odd and strange reason, I like kidnapping books. I think they're interesting and if done right can make me feel more than any other type of book (for the most part). So once I read the description of this, I thought it sounded like it would have an original spin on normal kidnapping books. And while it did, I think it fell flat.
First, the setting was nothing special, meaning a place most people think of when characters are kidnapped and kept somewhere. A place far away from everywhere else. I think Henry could have given us much more from Cheyenne through feeling and touching. It would have given more to the book as a whole and not just with the setting, in my opinion.
At first I thought the character would be great, to be honest. But then they just fell flat for me. I never completely felt for them, especially Cheyenne. She's been blind for three years, her mother died in that accident, she's sick, and now she's kidnapped. She was strong in the way I like for MC's to be, but I never completely felt emotionally for her. As for Griffin (male lead), I never felt for him either, nor did I ever get a solid personality. He just felt...there and not completely real. I think the minor characters were developed well, though, and the main two had potential, but it just didn't reach there completely.
I liked the writing, but I wasn't overly impressed. I didn't feel as though the dialogue fit well. It sounded like an author trying to write young at times rather than the characters each having their own voice. Sometimes I even stopped and thought, Would a character really say this? Now? Like that? Her writing flowed well and was easy to read, though. But it felt like she just played it safe instead of really diving into the scenes and characters and voices. It felt more like, "Let me tell you a story," rather than, "Listen to their story." She also asked too many rhetorical questions in her prose for my liking. Like Ally Condie did in Matched (did I mention that?). Again, her writing isn't bad at all, and is actually pretty good, but I just think she could have developed this story much, much more.
The plot felt rushed. That's my main view on this section. It just felt too rushed. While I never got bored with the book, it seemed like nothing really happened. Cheyenne is blind and sick with pneumonia, for crying out loud, and hardly anything happened at all with the sickness. She could have died, but all there was was some coughing every now and again and Griffin giving her some Advil. It was just dull. I felt as though there should have been so much more fear, but there wasn't any. Instead, Cheyenne and her kidnapper seem to hit it off within pages. Literally. It was just...too fast. Then the action didn't start until the end, and then it was poof! Over. The ending is what made me bump the rating down to two, because up until the last 30ish pages, I thought it was pretty good. I had my issues with it, but it held my attention and made me read. But the ending was just...dare I say it...dumb. Everything wrapped up, and even some things were left hanging wide open (and not "sequel" wide open; I mean "you made note to tell us about this and made it seem like something bad was going to happen to character, but then all of a sudden he's fine, so what happened?" open). I think the plot had a ton of potential and if it was developed more, it could have been great.
Overall, I liked it, but didn't love it like I wanted. It had potential and I wish it would have lived up to that. It's different and some of you may like it more than I did.
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