Review of Darkness

Darkness

By Elizabeth Arroyo

About:

Seventeen-year-old Carly Lopez suffers from post-traumatic stress, though the “post” part technically doesn’t apply…not when the killer is still out there. 

As the only survivor of the killing spree that left four dead girls in its wake, Carly fails to unearth her buried memories of that day and is consumed with guilt. After a year of silence, the killer is back, and Carly will stop at nothing to catch him. 

With each new death, Carly’s reality shatters, propelling her deeper into the darkness where the dead haunt her—but where the truth lies. Her only firm grasp of reality is Hunter Jackson, whose mysterious overprotectiveness of Carly forces her to doubt the reason behind her guilt.

But Hunter has a secret.

And when Carly discovers a horrible truth, she questions her involvement in the murders. Was she directly responsible? Did she help the killer? Carly soon learns that finding answers may mean risking more than just her sanity.

Source: Goodreads

My rating: 4.8/5

My Thoughts: 

**I was provided with a free ecopy of the Darkness via Xpresso Book Tours in exchange for an honest review.**

This is such an awesome read! Everyone thinks Carly is a freak, probably because she has psychotic outbursts in class and was committed to the asylum twice since her best friend’s murder. But they have no idea how bad it really is. Carly sees shadows, hears voices and has terrible nightmares that could be mistaken for lost memories.

Worst of all is that Carly was there when her best friend Olivia was taken but she can’t remember the killer’s face. It’s like her mind refuses to remember that part, and it’s killing her because she feels responsible for the deaths since Olivia’s. And so, Carly is secretly trying to investigate these murders to find out who this killer is. The more she delves into the killings, the stranger her own behaviour gets until she finds it hard to distinguish between what’s real and what isn’t. In trying to rid herself of guilt and help other girls, will Carly lose herself?

'Darkness' is brilliantly written, and it kept me on the edge until the last page. Yes, it was confusing at times but I loved that because it helped me understand how chaotic Carly’s thoughts were. Yes, there is something abnormal about her brain, something that sets her apart from other ‘normal’ teenagers, but that doesn’t mean her opinion shouldn’t matter. What I liked most about this book was how it shows that even though Carly has a mental instability, she’s still an intelligent girl that cares about her family, falls in love and basically deserves to be loved back.

It’s horrible how her mother blames Carly whenever Carly has even a hint of a relapse and she wants to institutionalise her, like as if she can’t handle it so she prefers to shove the responsibility on to someone else. Carly knows she’s not normal but clearly it stings when her mother won’t even try to handle it. Her brother, Christian, tries to be supportive, but he’s really concerned about Carly and knows that the more she goes investigating, the greater danger she will put herself into. And dear Hunter; so adorable and protective, but he doesn’t want to get too close to Carly either. I don’t’ want to reveal too much about Hunter’s role but he certainly has his share of secrets too…

Darkness is a thrilling book and was such a delight to read that I am now looking at other books available by this brilliant author.  

Zed (:

Favourite Quotes

“Don’t bother trying to figure me out. I can’t even figure me out.”

Hunter laughed. He also had dimples. She was doomed.

“…Are you, like, in between selves at the moment? I mean, it’s totally okay, I’m used to being around weird and have nothing against weird.” She’d been around herself for seventeen years. She’d perfected weird.

“Someone has to be putting him up to it. I’m sure he wouldn’t choose me to hang with unless he lost a bet or something.”
The doorbell rang again.
“Oh, grow up, Carly. Life is not like the movies. We popular guys don’t sit around making bets to de-hymenize the unsuspecting awkward female, or have time to try to schmooze a dweeb.”

Poor guy. He’d decided to help the wrong girl. She wasn’t a survivor. She just hadn’t caught up to her death yet.

“How are you?”
“Why do people ask that when they really don’t want to hear the truth?”

“Are you crazy?”
“Yeah, what’s your point?”