Review: Phobic (The Forbidden Doors #1) by Cortney Pearson

First thanks to Netgalley and Victory Editing for allowing me to read an egalley of this.  I didn't get to it until just now, but I'm glad I picked it out to read.  There were some issues with the story, it wasn't perfect. But it had a lot of unique bits while also being reminiscent of other scary books and movies.

The main character is Piper.  She lives in a very weird house, doors that open into nowhere, stairs that go nowhere, it makes lots of noises and does other strange things.  But not only does she have a weird house to deal with in her life, her mother is in prison for murder, and her father has recently died.  Her brother is taking care of her, but doesn't seem to really "get" her, or really be the kind of a parent she needs.  She has a best friend named Todd. But other than Todd, the people at school are cruel to her.  She's been bullied since the day she moved there.  After her mother went to prison, her father had the house moved, the whole house.  She's lived next door to Todd since they moved, and has been best friends with him since then.  Only now he's gone out for sports and has made friends with the guys on the team and their girlfriends.  Some of the kids who have treated her the worst, really picking on her about her acne among other things. 

Things have kind of changed recently as well.  Her brother has started acting really strange, and the house has even done stranger things. When Todd tries to get Piper to be friends with his new friends, he invites them to her house for a party.  But they show up the day before, and the house seems to take note.  It seems as if at times the house protects Piper.  Even though she begins seeing ghosts, like a loop in time of a maid and the former owner of the home, as well as another servant, all somewhat a part of a strange love triangle.  But not only does the house protect Piper, if something happens to the house, she is now feeling it and getting hurt.  And then, her brother disappears. 

Piper must solve the mystery of what the ghosts want, maybe she can send them on and save her life.  Not to mention finding her brother and saving him from what could be happening to him.  She has to try to convince Todd of what is happening and that she isn't crazy.  And she has to try to do all this before the house and the ghosts in it take her life and her brother's as well.

Like I said, there were definitely some parts of the story that were familiar, but the being connected to the house to the point that if someone hit or kicked it then it felt like they'd actually done that to Piper was one unique bit I felt.  The whole back story of the house was really involved and pretty spelled out.  I liked it.  I was glad to see that the ghosts, even the good ones, might not be as perfect as you thought they were.  And I even liked the relationship between Todd and Piper, once I figured out just what he was doing.  I see there is going to be a sequel, and I will be on the look out for it in the future.

Review: Get Even by Gretchen McNeil

First I must say thank you to Harper Collins and Balzer and Bray for allowing me to read an e-galley of this from Edelweiss.  Gretchen McNeil is an author that I heard lots of buzz about with her book Ten, before I even read any of her books.  So far 3:59 is my favorite of her books, but Get Even is a close 2nd!  At first as I was reading I though, oh, it's going to be a contemporary romance type of book.  But of course, it was more, and boy did it even get to be more than I'd expected. 

There are four main characters:  Kitty, Olivia, Bree, and Margot.  They aren't friends in "real" life, no one has ever really seen them together.  But ever since a project their 9th grade year, they decided to form a group called DGM for short, or Don't Get Mad.  All of them have dealt with bullying in some way in their past.  Margot used to be overweight, and was bullied, so badly that she tried to kill herself.  Kitty knew about it from a friend who got kicked off their volleyball team.  Olivia is one of the popular girls, and so is around friends who do it all the time.  And Bree's best friend is a boy named John, who gets teased a lot, because his last name could rhyme with a bad term for gay people.  They all go to a Catholic school where the bullying seems to be rampant, to the point that the adults often ignore name calling and even somewhat support the bullies at times.  DGM has a goal to stop the bullying.  They don't make stuff up, they only take what is already out there about these bullies and make it clear to everyone else.  The other students for the most part are fans of the DGM.   But not the administrator, Father Uberti, or F.U. as the girls call him snidely.  And also not one of the teachers, Coach Creed, who is really a big bully himself.

Something has changed now, someone is sending the four girls manila envelopes with pictures and other clues in them.  They are being led to a military school where the Coach used to be. And then one of their new students, a douche-bag type of guy named Ronny dies.  Right after DGM gets things to try to humiliate him for what he's done.  Some of the clues paint their fellow DGM members in a suspicious light, taking away what trust they have for each other.  Secrets start being kept from each other, while other secrets from the past start to get revealed.  The girls of DGM must decide if they can still trust each other to do what is right, the mission of DGM, or if the person behind all the secretive notes is one of them. 

Let me just say this ended on such a HUGE cliffhanger!  I had to go to the author's Facebook page and tell her that there was no way I'd be able to wait a whole year to know what happens next.  She said next summer is when the next book comes out, and that ARCs could be out as soon as December.  Believe you me, I'll be keeping my eyes wide open for it on both Netgalley and Edelweiss, as well as possibly researching to see who the publicity person is that I might be able to talk to so that I can make sure to get this read as soon as possible.  What a great mystery that totally kept me guessing, and with that ending, left me guessing still!