Review: Stop What You Are Reading and Start LOCKED Now!
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 03 7, 2014
You've got balls, Eva Morgan. Balls. And for that, I'm going to give you 4.5 stars all day long and round up to 5 stars for reviewing purposes. Because I like some grit in my story, even if it makes me want to stalk you down and yell at you for a while.LOCKED has all the things you may have loved from the old Sherlock Holmes stories. I have to admit, my knowledge of Sherlock Holmes is primarily from the television show, ELEMENTARY, rather than the original stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. LOCKED revolves around Sherlock Holmes and his neighbor Irene Adler and is told from Irene's perspective. Other notable appearances from the original version include Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's older brother, and James Moriarty, Sherlock's archenemy.When Irene meets Sherlock, she is in a dark place. Her only goal is to convince her mother she is coping, though she's actually battling significant depression after losing her sister a year earlier. So when her new neighbor is the brutally honest, blunt, and socially inept Sherlock, she quickly determines she will enjoy watching his assured demise at the local high school. Before long though, the one person she couldn't stand is the one person who sees and accepts the real her, darkness and all.I loved Sherlock's observations at the beginning of each chapter. The story is told from Irene's point of view and as such we observe Sherlock's brilliance as he reveals things to Irene, whether it's figuring out who is cheating on who or how he figured something out that no one else would have caught. But at the beginning of each chapter, we also get to see a brief glimpse into Sherlock's cluelessness when it comes to understanding emotions and feelings. The reader gets to see what impacted Sherlock the most during the chapter by an opening quote Sherlock writes down that he heard from Irene. We then get to see the progress of his (quite hilarious) investigation on why Irene doesn't seem to despise him the way the rest of the world does. The combination allowed me to fall in love with Irene and Sherlock simultaneously.Was right.  Death wish.  Subconscious or conscious, not sure.  Today: drove highly erratically, but subject agreed to get back in car.Also interesting: has passed point by which most people either stop speaking to me or attempt to cause me bodily harm.  Doesn't need to respond when I speak.  Why does she respond?  Pities me?  Childhood reinforcement to respond when spoken to?  Will investigate.Sherlock makes a tragic face.  I kick him under the table."What?" he whispers.  "I'm appealing to her motherly instinct by widening my eyes to evoke the aesthetic of an infant and projecting an aura of vulnerability so that she'll feel obligated to take me in.""It's mostly just creepy," I whisper back."I can hear you both, you know," says Mom.We freeze."She must have inherited those traits from you, as well as her large earlobes."I whip out my phone.  She's self-conscious about the earlobes.He glances down at the phone screen and looks up again.  "And by large I mean absolutely miniscule.  I would need a microscope to see those.  Truly tiny.""I told you he's not in love with me.""I don't understand that either.""Why not?""Well, I don't see how anyone could not be in love with you.""...Hey, I know--if you're serious about this date thing, we'll make it for both our birthdays.""If you're meaning we do things each of us wants to do, I've been fancying a trip to the morgue to collect data on--""No."As brilliant as Sherlock is, it is very easy for him to grow bored. So when a student at their school gets murdered, there is no stopping Sherlock from investigating who the murderer might be. I actually thought some of the investigation into the murder could have been cut out and this was probably the only thing pushing me towards a 4 star rating. However when things picked up again, they really picked up. My absolute favorite part of the story was the depth of the two main characters and the uniqueness of their personalities, in particular Sherlock's. He never ceased to amaze me.Anyone who enjoys young adult fiction and certainly anyone who has a fondness for the unique personality that is Sherlock Holmes should stop what they are reading and start LOCKED immediately! You can thank me later.**Complimentary copy provided by author/publisher for an honest review.