Tag: Amber Cowie

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Featured New Release Of The Week: Loss Lake by Amber Cowie

This week we’re looking at a solid mystery surrounding a small Canadian town on the shores of a lake that has a particularly dramatic ending. This week, we’re looking at Loss Lake by Amber Cowie.

Full disclosure: I’m writing this part of this blog on release day as I get ready to head down to EPCOT at Walt Disney World for the day – and I read this book almost two months (and 45 books) ago. Yes, as with very nearly *all* of my reading this year (other than three books over this past weekend), this was an ARC project – with all that this entails. 😀

This book is one of those mysteries where you’re never quite sure what is really going to happen. The titular lake features prominently and forebodingly throughout the narrative, and in fact plays an ultimately central role in the book. But really, the singular most defining piece of this book is its final words. Which led me to almost literally verbally scream out:

SCREW YOU, AMBER COWIE!!!!!!!!!

Now, I mean this in the best possible of ways. Seriously, it is more joke than actual rage. Because the ending is truly that explosive in both what and how it does its thing.

And that is the primary reason you need to read this book. To determine for yourself if my reaction mirrors your own. So go pick it up already. 😀

As always, the Goodreads review:
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Featured New Release of The Week: Raven Lane by Amber Cowie

This week we are looking at a stunning sophomore selection from a very promising new author. This week we are looking at Raven Lane by Amber Cowie.

In Cowie’s debut book last year she attempted a dual timeline story and did it very effectively – an accomplishment, considering that not even all experienced authors can pull that off. In this book, Cowie gets even more experimental with her craft and actually manages to weave in what is effectively a novella length story by the end of this book… *within this book*. This is a technique so rare in my reading experience as to nearly be unique, and Cowie does it astoundingly well, both in creating the novella and in weaving it into the overall tale of the main story.

The main story itself is full of twists and turns that will keep the reader guessing very nearly as long as her debut book did last year, and it does indeed feature several subjects that some might find troublesome. But if you like complicated characters and a well paced mystery, this is definetely the book for you. Overall a truly great work with only the barest hint of a sophomore slump – and that is more due to just how amazing the first book was rather than anything truly negative about this outing. Indeed, with the inclusion and execution of the novella, this is actually a stronger book in its totality. Very much recommended.

As always, the Goodreads/ Amazon review:
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Featured New Release Of The Week: Rapid Falls by Amber Cowie

This week, we’re looking at yet another book from a Lake Union author. Though in this case, we’re looking at the author’s actual debut book! This week, we’re looking at Rapid Falls by Amber Cowie.

This is a mystery that is told in two timelines – present day and twenty years ago, when Cara was in high school. Between the two timeline structure, the story is very well paced. You begin to get a sense of what is really happening and what really happened… and then yet another swerve is thrown in. And as big as some of the swerves are, the final one is very likely the biggest of them all. It is this final one in particular, in the very epilogue of the book, that will leave you breathless and mindblown.

There really is just not enough positive I can say about this book. It was solid from front to back, and I never saw any weakness at all to any aspect of the story or writing. Simply superb, and a gold standard for Cowie to attempt to meet with her sophomore work.

And as always, the Goodreads/ Amazon review:
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