Book Review: Unspoken by Sarah Rees Brennan

Title: Unspoken

Author: Sarah Rees Brennan
Series: The Lynburn Legacy, #1
Pages: 370
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's
Date of Publication: 27th September 2012
Source: Publisher*
Synopsis from Goodreads:
Kami Glass loves someone she’s never met . . . a boy she’s talked to in her head ever since she was born. She wasn’t silent about her imaginary friend during her childhood, and is thus a bit of an outsider in her sleepy English town of Sorry-in-the-Vale. Still, Kami hasn’t suffered too much from not fitting in. She has a best friend, runs the school newspaper, and is only occasionally caught talking to herself. Her life is in order, just the way she likes it, despite the voice in her head.

But all that changes when the Lynburns return.

The Lynburn family has owned the spectacular and sinister manor that overlooks Sorry-in-the-Vale for centuries. The mysterious twin sisters who abandoned their ancestral home a generation ago are back, along with their teenage sons, Jared and Ash, one of whom is eerily familiar to Kami. Kami is not one to shy away from the unknown—in fact, she’s determined to find answers for all the questions Sorry-in-the-Vale is suddenly posing. Who is responsible for the bloody deeds in the depths of the woods? What is her own mother hiding? And now that her imaginary friend has become a real boy, does she still love him? Does she hate him? Can she trust him?

My Thoughts:
I've never read anything by Sarah Rees Brennan before, but I've met her a couple of times now and she's awesome, so I was excited to read this book. It made me laugh, it made me sad, and it kept me glued to the pages, needing to know what happened, and to be honest, it was pretty awesome.

I really liked the whole idea of the book, even if it was a little cliched. At first I didn't really like the whole idea of Kami and Jared being able to read each others' minds and being able to communicate telepathically, it all sounded sort of familiar and just done way too many times before. It was cheesy and kind of annoying, and just weird, but as the book goes on and how it happened is explained, it fits really well and made the book even more interesting than it as before. It surprised me how much I liked it!

The book is based in a small town that has a lot of old stories, legends, and mythology associated with it, and I really liked that the Lynburns were the centre of it and the centre of the story. They were interesting and I liked guessing what they were, because it was obvious they weren't quite human. When I found out I was surprised but I'm pretty sure that's because I was just being ignorant and didn't realise how blindingly obvious it way... Anyway, I liked that they tied in with the local mystery, and it meant that Kami and Jared didn't have to be all secret about everything, and the best about this was that they could share what they were going through with Kami's best friends, Angela and Holly. I've had enough of the secretive best friend who falls in love with a boy and then becomes a crappy friend because they can't tell them they're not human...

The characters in this book are awesome. Every single one had some kind of purpose, and I definitely didn't feel like any of them were there just for the sake of giving Kami someone to talk to (which I've come across a couple of times in recent books I've read, which is why I've pointed it out). I really liked Angela and Rusty (Kami's best friend and her brother). Angela gets herself into a tricky situation but due to Rusty's self defense lessons, she could get herself out of it and it was so, so awesome. She was badass, seriously ;P Holly was cool too, though she seemed kind of shady... I don't know, maybe Kami's judgmental and confused ways have rubbed off on me!

And I was always changing my mind about Kami... She seemed kind of reckless and impulsive, and usually I don't mind that but Kami would blurt out things that you really shouldn't say to certain people, or she'd do something that was just so immensely stupid that you wonder what on earth was going through her brain. I don't know, for the most part I did really liked her and I loved seeing her relationship with Jared grow (or, not grow) but she did strike me as being kind of air-headed. It's not a hugely bad thing, I just like to see characters (and just people in general) be sensible and not always nearly get themselves killed.

The book is full of twists and turns, especially near the end, and I never knew who it was doing the killing. I had my suspicions, which turned out to be completely wrong, but still. I was confused by the ending a little bit, as it was incredibly fast paced, and to me the writing seemed a little bit jumpy (like there should have been a line break or something to indicate that at least a few moments had passed) but on the whole it wasn't too hard to understand, if I stopped and thought about it for a moment. It was very gripping though, and I literally read the last 100 pages in about 45 minutes (no, I'm not sure how either). I'm looking forward to reading other books by Sarah and am super excited for the next one!  I would definitely recommend it if you're a fan of young adult paranormal, and want something light and funny to read over the weekend.