"Evil wears many faces; some of the worst being concealed by the most pious masks."
Reviewed by Lynn Cunningham
Posted September 3, 2013
Thriller Psychological
Dr. Nadine Lavoie is a psychiatrist totally involved in
helping others heal from the various miseries in their
lives. A young woman is brought into the hospital she's
affiliated with one night from a suicide attempt. In trying
to help this young woman, she's stunned to discover that her
own past has somehow landed at her doorstep.
At least she thinks it has because there are large portions
of her childhood that she simply cannot remember. When she
was a child, her mother had taken her and her brother to
stay with a small group of people who were living in a
commune. Something terrible happened there that left Nadine
with severe claustrophobia and no memory of what the event
was. Now, Nadine is determined to ferret out whatever trauma
her childhood may hold. However, there's someone who will
keep her from remembering no matter what it takes.
Chevy Stevens has done it again with ALWAYS WATCHING! Her
first two books in which Nadine's character plays a small,
but pivotal role, were page turners of the most serious
kind. Now, Ms. Stevens treats us to a complete book built
around Nadine, and it is, indeed, a treat.
The sign of a great writer is when that writer can take
words and craft them into stories that are compelling to the
point that you're simply held in thrall by them. Chevy
Stevens has that gift. She builds her stories and relates
them in such a way that there's no putting down that book
until you've found the answers to all of the mysteries. Yes,
you can probably tell that I'm a huge fan of this woman's
writing.
ALWAYS WATCHING takes a delicate and distasteful topic and
shows the truth about it. She doesn't pull you into a happy
and joyful fantasyland. Rather, she shows the real world in
her stories. That doesn't mean it is all doom and gloom,
though. Ms. Stevens seems to also believe that there's a
redeeming quality to just about everyone. So while she
unmasks the many faces of evil and exposes them for what
they are she also offers hope that there are ways of
fighting that evil and winning.
For readers that have devoured the first two books by Chevy
Stevens, ALWAYS WATCHING is a must read. Although this one
can stand on its own, if you haven't discovered this
talented writer yet, you may want to have all three of these
on hand to read in order.
SUMMARY
She helps people put their demons to rest. But she has a few of her own… 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? And then, the unthinkable happens, and Nadine realizes that
danger is closer to home than she ever imagined. She has no
choice but to face what terrifies her the most…and fight
back. Sometimes you can leave the past, but you can never escape. Told with the trademark powerful storytelling that has had
critics praising her work as “Gripping” (Kirkus), “Jaw-
dropping” (Publishers Weekly) and “Crackling with suspense”
(People magazine), ALWAYS WATCHING shows why Chevy Stevens
is one of the most mesmerizing new talents of our day.
What do you think about this review?
Comments
No comments posted.
Registered users may leave comments.
Log in or register now!
|
© 2003-2024 off-the-edge.net
all rights reserved Privacy Policy