Pages

Friday, July 12, 2013

Always Watching by Chevy Stevens- Six Sentence Bookish Thoughts

cover image via Goodreads.com

What Always Watching is about:
In the lockdown ward of a psychiatric hospital, Dr. Nadine Lavoie is in her element. She has the tools to help people, and she has the desire—healing broken families is what she lives for. But Nadine doesn’t want to look too closely at her own past because there are whole chunks of her life that are black holes. It takes all her willpower to tamp down her recurrent claustrophobia, and her daughter, Lisa, is a runaway who has been on the streets for seven years. When a distraught woman, Heather Simeon, is brought into the Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit after a suicide attempt, Nadine gently coaxes her story out of her—and learns of some troubling parallels with her own life. Digging deeper, Nadine is forced to confront her traumatic childhood, and the damage that began when she and her brother were brought by their mother to a remote commune on Vancouver Island.  What happened to Nadine?  Why was their family destroyed? And why does the name Aaron Quinn, the group’s leader, bring complex feelings of terror to Nadine even today? 

Chevy Stevens quickly became a favorite author of mine with her gripping debut, and equally impressive follow up book. So with that in mind, I was eagerly anticipating her newest release.  Well folks, I'm sad to say that this one was just okay for me. There wasn't really a lot of suspense, and honestly, I hated the first person narrative. On top of that, there was wayyyy too much tragedy for one person and coincidences gushing from every sentence. I just didn't buy it, which made me very sad.

Recommend? Well, if you've read her other two works, then of course, you will want to read this one. IMHO, I just felt that it didn't come close to her other stories. Maybe my expectations were too high? If you haven't read Chevy, I can highly recommend Still Missing and Never Knowing. Those two books made me want to read in the bright sun of the day because of the scare factor!

Source: St. Martin's Press via NetGalley
ebook352 pages
Published June 18th 2013 by St. Martin's Press



Six Sentence Bookish Thoughts #115
© 2013, Staci of Life in the Thumb. All Rights Reserved. If you reading this on a site other than, Life in the Thumb or Staci's feed, be aware that this post has been stolen and is used without permission.

21 comments:

  1. I always like when you don't like a book because then I know I can safely skip it!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I sometimes want to be scared but not often, at least not Stephen King scared. Sometimes it's hard for a writer to keep the impetus going, into a third book.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am going to have to check this author out!!!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I do want to read this author, but will start with one of the other two books you mentioned - thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Too bad this one didn't work for you. I think we do have expectations when we've read an author's previous works, which makes sense.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Sorry this didn't live up to your expectations.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I have this one on Sparky, and I'm planning to read it next week. Sorry you didn't enjoy it as much as the other two...but who knows? Maybe I will.

    Thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I can always check the library but I think not

    ReplyDelete
  9. Is this the 3rd in a series? I just got the audio of this one from the library, but I haven't read the first 2 yet:(

    ReplyDelete
  10. Bummer. I've only read her first and liked it. Looks like I can skip this one.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Sorry to hear it was just meh. Too much sadness is not good. :-(

    ReplyDelete
  12. I am sad to hear this isn't as good as her other two books. I really enjoyed the other two. I think I will just skip this one.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Sorry to hear this book is not as good as the author's other two books. I really enjoyed the first two books and was looking forward to the new book. I think I will just skip it now.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Bummer, and I was looking forward to this one but since it didn't live up to Still Missing it can wait :(

    ReplyDelete
  15. I haven't read past Still Missing, which I thought was only okay.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Oh no! I was so looking forward to this one. At least I have her second book still unread to look forward to. I think I just may wait on this one until it becomes available at the library. Thanks for the honest review :)

    ReplyDelete
  17. You aren't the first person I've seen that hasn't thought this one as good as her others. That's too bad because it sure sounds good.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Oh bummer! I really enjoyed the first two as well, but will still give this one a chance.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Thanks for the honest review, Staci. I loved her first book, but was very disappointed with Never Knowing. From my blog:

    I read Stevens’ debut thriller Still Missing in December 2010. I thought it was quite compelling, so I was pretty excited when I got the ARC of Never Knowing. As usual, it languished on my TBR stack for quite some time, but when the audio version became available through my local library, I decided it was time to give the book a try. Honestly, I wish I hadn’t. It was awful. Flat characters, ridiculous dialogue, a predictable plot and a dreadful reader had me shaking my head with annoyance. Why in the world I stuck with this audio presentation for 12 hours (!!) is beyond me.

    I think I'll skip the new one.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Still need to pick up Still Missing - but will bear in mind the reading in daylight warning!

    ReplyDelete
  21. I really enjoyed the other two novels, which has me curious about this one. I think I'll snag it from the library

    ReplyDelete

Hello Friends!! I want to take this moment to say thank you. Thank you for taking the time to visit my blog and thank you for leaving me a comment.

* Because of the excessive spam I have decided not to allow anonymous users to comment.

Happy Reading!