Sunday, June 10, 2012

Lies Beneath (Lies Beneath #1) by Anne Greewood Brown



Summary:

Calder White lives in the cold, clear waters of Lake Superior, the only brother in a family of murderous mermaids. To survive, Calder and his sisters prey on humans, killing them to absorb their energy. But this summer the underwater clan targets Jason Hancock out of pure revenge. They blame Hancock for their mother's death and have been waiting a long time for him to return to his family's homestead on the lake. Hancock has a fear of water, so to lure him in, Calder sets out to seduce Hancock's daughter, Lily. Easy enough—especially as Calder has lots of practice using his irresistable good looks and charm on ususpecting girls. Only this time Calder screws everything up: he falls for Lily—just as Lily starts to suspect that there's more to the monsters-in-the-lake legends than she ever imagined. And just as his sisters are losing patience with him.

Reviewer: Fashionta
Calder and his three sisters are mermaids living in Lake Superior who lure humans into the water and not only drown them but eat them to absorb their positive energy. They also have a huge death wish for Jason Hancock, who they blame their mother's death on. Calder doesn't have the blood thirst of his sisters who were born mermaids while he was turned one as a child. When one of his sisters offers him a deal for his freedom from them in exchange for luring Jason into their clutches he gladly takes it. His plan is to get close to Jason's daughter Lily but what he doesn't expect is to fall in love with her instead.

So let's start with what I loved about this story. I'm giving a high rating for the male POV in a M/F young adult book which is hardly ever done and on those few occasions it is done it's also accompanied by a female POV. Speaking of Calder, man oh man! did I love him. He had all the qualities I love in a character, he's the ultimate bad boy (I mean he was planning on killing Lily's dad), he is cocky, beautiful and every other girl wants him but he only wants one girl even though he knows he shouldn't. I also loved that these aren't Little Mermaid kind of mermaids, these are killing machines that are out for blood and want to live off of human emotions.

Ok now for what I didn't like. First the biggest disappointment is the ending. When i picked this book up I didn't realize it is the first in a trilogy. If I had known this prior, I probably would have waited until at least the second one was out especially after the kinda cliffhanger ending. The second is not enough character development for Lily. We really know Calder but Lily isn't fleshed out. I'm guessing this will be fixed in the second novel because it's from her POV. Also along those lines, I felt like these mermaids aren't fully developed, we get to understand how a mermaid thinks and acts but we don't know if mermaids have been around forever or only 100 years. We don't know if mermaids only live in lakes or also rivers and oceans, and we don't really know about how or why mermaids are made and I would like to find out these details that serve as a backstory to the plot's progression. Next was the insta-love/stalking. God, I'm so sick of insta-love as a plot device. Calder starts mentioning loving Lily after speaking to her once! Why is it every author thinking that insta-love is this amazing romantic thing because it's really not and it bears no resemblance to real life. And the stalking! Woohoo! I am all for the male being so obsessed with the female that he wants to always be around her but this stalking was a little much. Calder doesn't do anything the entire book but follow her around and it was only half because of his feelings for her; the other half was his attempt to get closer to her father.

All in all, this was an okay read. I haven't read a lot of mermaid books and really liked parts of this but just wanted more which I'm hoping will happen in the next two in this series. I'm giving Lies Beneath 3.5 stars and think it's worth the read.


Publisher:Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Review Courtesy Of: NetGalley



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