There is No Light in Darkness - Claire Contreras

therhinofam · Post by **therhinofam** » 29 Sep 2014, 18:35

While this book boasts a beautiful cover and an intriguing plot line, the story begins to fizzle midway through the book and sadly never regains it's footing. In the first half of the book, we are introduced to one of the main characters, Blake, through the writer's use of penning between Blake's past and Blake's present. As a young child, Blake witnessed the murder of both of her parents and was then abducted by someone at the murder. Blake was placed with a loving aunt and then went on to live with a loving foster mother. However, that fateful night still plagues Blake. The one person Blake allows herself to be vulnerable with is Cole, her childhood boyfriend whom she separated from shortly after high school.

While Cole and Blake rekindle their relationship in very steamy portions of the book, it felt flat. The initial moment when they "get back together" is fueled with a hot physical reconnection, but is lacking the emotional connect so it feels more like a fling...except they stay together. The writer continues through the book to try to add in the emotional connect but it falls very short of believable.

Add in that Blake now has mysterious amounts of money, someone appears to be following her, and she begins to recognize men from the night her parents were murdered, it is a lot of story lines that become tangled rather than seeming together. Topped off with a cliffhanger ending that forces you to get book 2, this book leaves readers frustrated and trying to remember what exactly is going on.

hollirm · Post by **hollirm** » 19 Oct 2014, 18:37

I find it interesting that you are the second person to say the same thing about this book. I read a review over the second book but the first book was also mentioned. They also said that there was a different writing style for the first half of the first book then the rest of the book and the second book.

therhinofam · Post by **therhinofam** » 21 Oct 2014, 15:23

hollirm wrote:I find it interesting that you are the second person to say the same thing about this book. I read a review over the second book but the first book was also mentioned. They also said that there was a different writing style for the first half of the first book then the rest of the book and the second book.

It was not a second person; it was me both times. This is the review of the first book. The other review is for the second book. I would actually have loved to see them together in a single book with some additional editing.

The first half of book 1 depicts the main character, Blake, as a strong and confident woman trying to piece together gaps from her past and reconcile her heart with the man she loves, Cole. The first half also has the reader alternating between Blake's past and her present. Once the reader is about half way through the book, the alternating stops and then the author begins to impose random jumps in time. It didn't feel very cohesive for the story.