Review: The Obsession

Sometimes I fall for a book for nostalgic reasons. Such was the case with The Obsession by Jesse Q. Sutanto, a YA suspense novel about a girl with a mountain of secrets under the thumb of a creepy teenage boy stalker. Simply put, Teenage Wendy would have loved this book.  She would have probably read a copy from the school or local public library, then desperately saved up money to buy her own copy so she could draw little hearts in the margins.  Have I mentioned that Teenage Wendy was kind of bloodthirsty?  I occasionally strayed but by and large if the book didn't have at least one dead body in it, I wasn't interested.  I also was drawn to competent women from a very early age. Oh sure, the women could be in danger (see every book Mary Higgins Clark ever wrote) but they always pulled themselves out of it in the end.  So yeah, I was primed to love The Obsession from the start, and I did.

Delilah is a Daddy's Girl left adrift after her father dies in an industrial accident (that also was an environmental disaster). Her mother, also adrift, eventually starts dating Brandon, a local cop. Turns out though that Brandon is an abusive asshole, with both Delilah and her Mom bearing the brunt of his rages. They're stuck. They can't go to the cops. Brandon IS the cops. Now her Mom is talking about quitting the job she loves to keep control freak abusive Brandon happy and Delilah has to tread lightly if she wants to keep going to Draycott Academy, a ritzy prep school that her Dad's insurance policy is paying the tuition for. On her first day of school she catches the eye of Logan and that's when things go from bad to worse.

Logan was obsessed with a girl name Sophie. A girl who got hooked on drugs and tragically died. In fact, someone is dealing drugs out of Draycott, a case Brandon has been working on. Every one tells Logan that Sophie is just toying with him, using him, but he's IN LOVE and naturally goes off the deep end when she dies.  His mother finds evidence of his stalking, he tries to kill himself, and he's seeing the school counselor.  The kid is, quite frankly, a scary AF nutbag.  And then he sees Delilah, who looks so much like Sophie that it shocks him out of his funk and suddenly Logan is back to his old stalkerish ways.

The problem being that Delilah doesn't know yet that Logan IS stalking her.  One day, when she's home alone with Brandon, she snaps and Brandon ends up dead (Delilah definitely kills him, but to say more is a spoiler because oh it's just so fantastically gory!).  Logan, of course, catches the whole thing on camera - because he's a stalker. When Delilah finds out the cutest boy in school who likes her is actually a creepy AF stalker?  Well, she's stuck.  Because of course Logan is now blackmailing her with the video.

This sounds suitably dark and twisted - which, it is. What makes it great is that Delilah is a bit of a mouse on the outside, but when pushed to the breaking point our girl is all vengeful Valkyrie. Brandon's ex-partner is now sniffing around, Logan is controlling her every breath, and she's still got yet another whopper of a secret that she has to keep under wrap.  Delilah may seem like a mouse but ultimately she is a survivor, and when you back a survivor into a corner?  Bad things happen.

Is this nice book?  Well, no.  There's no ambiguous to the moral choices that Delilah makes over the course of this story.  She "wins" but at the expense of doing some really terrible things.  Is she justified in those terrible choices?  Certainly yes, you could say that - for some of them.  But like I said, Delilah has got many, many secrets.

Is Delilah a "bad girl?" Is she a "good girl?" Yes. And that's why I loved this book.  It's the how she's going to wiggle her way out of the mess that makes for compelling reading and the fact that our girl is a study in contrasts is a reason why, I'm sure, Sourcebooks has already tapped Sutanto to write a sequel.  Oh sure, everyone in Romancelandia may be talking about Dial A for Aunties right now, but I'll be over here hanging out with cunning, bloodthirsty Delilah thank you.  I'll also be watching my back.

Final Grade = A

Review: The Obsession

The entire time I was listening to The Obsession by Nora Roberts the phrase "damning with faint praise" kept running through my mind.  Which means I feel the need to explain how I tend to approach romantic suspense.

I was a mystery/suspense reader long before romance, so when it comes to romantic suspense I tend to be a Suspense First, Love Cooties Second kind of gal.  And I've long accepted that this puts me in a small minority in Romancelandia.  The premise of this book is dynamite.  Roberts really outdid herself cooking up this one.  The downside?  With the suspense concept so dynamite I totally began to think of the "romance stuff" as "filler."  Which probably isn't a good sign.

Shortly before her 12th birthday, Naomi Carson follows her father out into the early morning dawn and discovers he's a monster.  He's been raping and murdering women for years, using an old, abandoned cellar to carry-out his evil.  Naomi discovers a woman, still alive, that day and rescues her.  Her father is arrested, but it's only the beginning.  Her, her mother, her younger brother, go to live with mother's brother - looking for a fresh start.  But the past doesn't stay buried - even after Naomi is all grown up, and finally trying to settle down in the Pacific Northwest.

The first part of this book is bloody fantastic.  It's the story of Young Naomi, her rescuing her father's latest victim, her father's arrest, and the fall-out from realizing that Daddy is a monster.  Then the story jumps to present day.  After years of traveling the country, working as a photographer, Naomi falls in love with a rundown house, decides to fix it up, plant roots, and falls in love (rather unwillingly at first) with Xander Keaton, local mechanic, singer in a bar band, and all around good guy.  She's finally starting to settle down, to let people get close, when someone following in her father's footsteps finds her.

Here's the issue.  Once we're past the Young Naomi portion of the story, we get into Settling Down Grown-up Naomi.  Grown-up Naomi:

Buys a rundown house
Hires a contractor to fix it up
Blah, blah, blah whole bunch of renovation/remodeling porn
Finds an abandoned dog
Keeps the abandoned dog, reluctantly
Falls in love with the dog, because of course
Starts tap-dancing around Xander
Cooks several delicious meals
Takes a bunch of photographs - work, work, work
Romance, romance, blah blah blah....

I. Don't. Care.

Yes, it's harsh.  But the whole concept of this book (that even serial killers can, and sometimes do, have loved ones, family, friends - they're not always loners....) is so fantastic.  That's what I want.  I want more of that.  I don't give a flying hoot about Naomi finding the perfect desk to rehab for her home office.  Or that she makes Eggs Benedict for Xander and he practically orgasms on the spot.

I. Just. Don't. Care.

But back to the suspense.  Once it shows up again (Praise Jeebus!), Naomi has to stop running from her past and admit some hard truths.  The one (and it's big) downside is that while the concept of the suspense is fantastic, the actually WhoDunIt is....obvious.  As in, really, really obvious.  I felt like Roberts' tipped her hand way too early and there are no credible red herrings or uses of misdirection.  Which made getting through the I. Don't. Care. Renovation, Dog Owning, Cooking Porn even more tedious.  I know who the bad guy is.  Can't we just skip all this other stuff and get to the end?

Seriously, I wonder what this book would have been like as a Harlequin Intrigue?  I'm thinking pretty awesome.

The world-building is good, the characterizations are good, and Roberts writes small town life in a way that doesn't make me want to put my fist through a wall (no cutesy cupcake shops!).  And Roberts is a great storyteller.  This is a good story.  The plot concept is great!  But it's how it's executed that I found myself bored by.  I also wanted the mystery to be a bit beefier.  Some twists and turns would have been nice.  This is more straight line.  Wide open space.

I'm not sure where this leaves me and my reaction to this book.  I hate giving it a low grade.  I recognize the good story.  I recognize that I liked these people, I liked the concept - I just didn't really care for how it was all executed.  So it's going to be a middling grade, but it's honestly probably better than that.  Especially if you're a Romance First, Suspense Second romantic suspense reader.

Final Grade = C+