“Noo! It couldn’t just end! NO!” This incredulous exclamation, followed by a lot of hopeful scrolling, was what happened immediately after I finished Unspoken. It was a great read, and I truly, TRULY wanted it to continue. The end of the novel is a fantastic cliffhanger, but I cannot wait until the next book in the series comes out. I must say this: one should think twice before moving to a place called Sorry-in-the-Vale!
Unspoken revolves around Kami Glass, a curiosity-driven teen with ambitions to be an investigative newspaper reporter, who has lived in Sorry-in-the-Vale her whole life but has never truly fit into the town. She’s something of an oddball to the other inhabitants thanks to her Japanese ancestry and the fact that she’s had an imaginary friend, a boy named Jared, her entire life. Sorry-in-the-Vale becomes a much darker and stranger place as the mysterious and intimidating Lynburn family moves back into town. Before they all left, the Lynburns were the leading family in the town, the wealthiest and the most powerful...in more ways than one. There are two younger Lynburns: polite, chivalrous Ash and shadowed, sharp Jared. Yes. That Jared. It turns out that Kami’s imaginary friend isn’t so ephemeral after all, and he’s just as surprised to see that she exists outside his head as she is to realize he’s in-the-flesh real. Once the Lynburns return, dark secrets begin to bubble up from beneath the town’s surface, and murder and magic create a twisted mystery that Kami feels a deep need to uncover.
On a purely aesthetic note, the cover of this book snagged me before anything else. It’s simple, elegant and intriguing, and judging by my reaction to it, it has the potential to make readers want to snatch it off the shelf. Plus, I totally love the type font they used and the colors go so well together. Awesome job, cover designer! Huzzah!
Unspoken is one of those books that grabbed my attention and demanded that I read it, even when I was already reading other books. I stayed up super late reading it more than once, and even though some parts of the book seriously creeped me out, I just couldn’t put it down. The characters were fantastic, the storyline was captivating, and oh my gosh, magical forests of awesome! Plus, it's funny. I know, murder, death and gore don't always go along with funny, but in this instance, it works, mainly because most of the humor is in the witty dialogue. Some of it literally had me giggling and reading it outloud to my co-workers and friends, who had no idea what was going on...but it made me laugh!
As for the characters, I am seriously attached to them. Kami in particular is a great character; I think she's realistic, clever, insanely curious, a little selfish (in a good, character-flaw way!), confused and delightfully human. Jared is an awesome male lead; personally, he isn’t my pick for boyfriend of the year because of his internal angst and possessiveness, but I love his attitude and his personality. Most of the other characters seem well-rounded as well, and I liked that everyone seems to have faults; gotta love the characters who aren’t the epitome of perfection, they’re so much more interesting that way. There were just a couple character growth choices that I didn’t particularly like, but they didn’t ruin the book for me, and most people will probably be fine with those choices. I liked the flow of the story and Brennan’s good mix of dialogue and description. I’m very curious to know more about the magic in this book; it wasn't really explained except for the idea that it seems to be a nature-based kind of magic. I’d love to learn more about it in future books in the series. All in all, I really enjoyed this book, and I will impatiently wait for the next one to be published!
I received the ARC copy of Unspoken through NetGalley.com thanks to the publisher Random House Children's Books. Thank you!
