Review: Dollhouse by Anya Allyn

Title: Dollhouse
Author: Anya Allyn
File Size: 412 KB
Print Length: 295 pages
Page Numbers Source ISBN: 1475034725
Language: English
ASIN: B007PLAVH4
Source: Own
[Amazon]

Fifteen year old Aisha disappears in the forests on a school hiking trip. She's the latest in a string of children to vanish there over the past five years. The towns surrounding the forests are on edge and they demand answers. And wildboy Ethan—Aisha's boyfriend—is on the run after he and his grandfather are blamed for Aisha's disappearance.

Cassie is just about the only friend Ethan has left. She's been secretly in love with him ever since her mother dragged her to the wilds of Australia from Florida six months ago.

Desperate to prove Ethan's innocence, Cassie searches the forests with Ethan to find out what really happened to Aisha. But Ethan's growing strangely silent, and Cassie's left questioning if her feelings for him are clouding her judgment.

Cassie discovers a dark secret lurking in the heart of the forests; a secret world of nightmarish horrors—where nothing is as it seems, where the supernatural invades your soul, where the people she trusted most might be the people she can trust the least, and where escape exists only in dreams. [Goodreads]

Goodreads | Amazon

Review

This book has been…difficult to review.  I liked it, but it frustrated me too.

The cover is so pretty.  I’m not usually one to gush over a cover, but look at that jpeg up there!

The prose was disjointed at times.  It felt jumpy, like the thoughts were incomplete.  Kinda like you’re inside Cassie’s head, participating in the moment with her.  Which isn’t a bad thing, I just didn’t work for me.  With this book.

I didn’t care a thing for Cassie.  She waivered too much, sometimes embracing her role as heroine, and others just collapsing in on herself unable to cope with all that’s going on.  I realize she’s only 15, and there’s a lot of things to deal with, that the “dark secret” is a lot to deal with, but she never seemed vulnerable, just weak.  Her strength coming too little too late.  AND, she’s American, but speaks in phrases and using words that are distinctly Australian.  That created a little disparity for me—that’s a major detail to get wrong.

I got this book from Amazon for Kindle, and it was free (it’s not anymore).  Even free/inexpensive books should be completely edited.  This wasn’t.  Blatantly under-edited.  I don’t like reading final-print books that are poorly edited.  It’s frustrating.

The story itself was pretty good.  I was completely drawn in and read it on my iPhone any chance I could find, even staying up late into the night finish it.  I liked where the story was headed, we just had some trouble getting there.  Allyn left too many questions unanswered for me, too many holes that have yet to be filled.  And just when things have reached a boiling point, and the pot’s about to explode all over the place, the story ends.  It just ends!  Leaving me reeling, disoriented, and very confused.  To find out what happens, you have to read the next book! What? 

And here’s where my biggest issue of all is…am I invested enough to pay $3.99 for the next book in the series?  I just don’t know.

For now I’m just going to pull a Cassie and waiver.

 

3 Moons

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