Review: Darkly Beautiful...
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 05 27, 2014
Wow. That was an incredibly dark but oddly beautiful book. When I found out that Lily White was teaming up with Dawn Robertson, blending their talents to bring a darkly delicious tale to life, I was in. I adore Lily White's writing style and while this is my first outing with Dawn Robertson's particular brand of weaving words, it won't be my last.The Good Girl is an impressive story filled with a darkness that is layered deeply with conflicting emotions. It's gorgeous, harsh, unforgiving and heartbreaking. It's also lovely and held me captive all the way thru to the the last page. Suffice it to say, I loved this book.Eleni is a broken woman with some very dark skeletons in her closet. To cope with the disaster of her past and the pain that rides around in her head, she drinks and has copious amounts of inappropriate one night stands. Drifting meaninglessly through her life until the moment she gets kidnapped by Gabriel. Gabriel is a dark dark soul with schizophrenia, after suffering and surviving an accident that stole his parents life, he lived but didn't walk away unscathed. With a growing darkness that consumes him, he becomes obsessed with Eleni. As Gabriel fights with his inner demons and rips apart Eleni, I felt the conflicting emotions that they both went through. It was intriguing as Gabriel's feelings bounced back and forth between wanting to save her and hating her.One of the things that I loved about this book, is that it was told through alternating points of view. Being able to be inside both of their heads and see and feel what they were as the story twisted along it's dark path brought a depth to the story that would have been sorely missing had it just been told from only one of their points of view. I also loved that both Gabriel and Eleni are both incredibly damaged individuals, that neither one of them is perfect cookie cutter characters. All of the art was a major plus as well, I adore when characters have tattoos and both of them had them everywhere.The Good Girl is an extremely dark book, I wasn't bothered by where the story went because I happen to love the dark genre. But if you don't like dark or if you are new to dark, this may stretch you - a lot. It deals with a crapload of dark and difficult subjects, including some very interesting bits about schizophrenia. There is also rape, abuse and other familiar subjects that come with a dark read.If dark doesn't bother you or you are looking for a book a little out of your comfort zone then definitely check this book out. Lily White is truly the Queen of Dark and Dawn Robertson really does well alongside her. I really hope that they choose to collaborate again.All in all, I loved The Good Girl. It was dark, yet hopeful and completely addictive.Complimentary copy provided for an honest review.Originally posted on Me, Myself & Books