Book: Lies that Bind

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Author: CJ Stone

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Thank you NetGalley and Dreamscape Media for an advanced audio copy.

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The premise of Lies That Bind was heartbreaking and intriguing. The two main characters Jess and Frankie are siblings. Frankie calls Jess telling her their dad had committed suicide. After their mom received the news she was then in a fatal car crash. She and her five your old daughter, Lily were killed but her nine-year-old son Tommy survived.

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Jess is the oldest and assumed the role of guardian. A lot of the story is about how Jess needs to change her life and figure out how to make an income to even get to be their legal guardian. A lot of this I did not find interesting.

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Frankie had a lot of his own drama with bullies at school and girls which mostly was uninteresting as well.

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Tommy is where some of the interesting moments happened. Tommy was convinced he was seeing the ghost of his parents at night. He was not the only one feeling that something was going off. You are trying to figure out if this is something paranormal, sinister, or just in their heads. That’s where the story excelled. Some of it was scary, some of it was unsettling, and all of it was tense. However, the way this concluded was definitely rushed and failed to explore all the aspects.

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I do understand we need to learn about the characters for the story to hit emotionally. I just wish this story had fewer explanations about the characters and more drama with the house.

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Final score 2/5