FRIEND REQUEST Review

Review:

Facebook is certainly an interesting thing. Despite my frustrations with the social media site, I still use it quite often to keep up with friends and family, share in major life events, and of course occasionally creep on those long left in my past. We all do it. Naturally, when I read this book’s premise I had to immediately request an advance reader’s copy from Netgalley, and luckily I was accepted. The conceit — grown woman receives a Facebook friend request from a high school friend who has been dead for twenty-five years — is one that grabbed me from the start. Unfortunately, the story did not live up to the thrills and scared promised by this novel’s synopsis.

 

It was steady going for the first twenty percent or so . . . and then I started making excuses for not returning to this story. Louise, the main character, is likable enough albeit not relatable to me. I could not really empathize with her, nor could I with any of the other characters. Honestly, these people just weren’t fun to read about; I found them to be rather lifeless.

 

I was expecting a twisty, psychologically taxing and challenging story — instead I got a bit of a snooze fest. I figured everything out by the time I was a third of the way in. The ending is largely telegraphed, and I was largely able to predict a lot of the plot. Lame! This is supposed to be a thriller mystery, and it fails on that basic level — hence my low rating. This author can write well: her word choices are good and her prose flows. I would, theoretically, be interested in reading something else by her. Her skills as a writer kept me going until the end, even when I didn’t want to. It is simply unfortunate the plot of this mystery about ghosts from the past and long-buried grievances wasn’t more involving or challenging.

 

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC, which was given in exchange for an honest review.

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