Sunday, January 9, 2011

Edge of Escape, by Debra Chapoton

Edge of Escape, by Debra Chapoton is the definition of a page-turner! As you start the book, a girl wakes up in the dark, handcuffed to a bed. She can’t feel the floor. She can feel the low ceiling. She doesn’t know where she is or what is happening to her.  From then on, you can’t stop turning the pages.

This girl, Rebecca, is very resourceful, and gives her captor, Eddie, a run for his money.  Eddie was one of those “special” kids in school who bore the brunt of much bullying. He’s had a tragic childhood and a mother who didn’t know how to help him, so the reader has some sympathy for him.  He’s always been “in love” with Rebecca and thinks he can win her over and make her love him.  Disturbing, to say the least.

This book is all about plot.  If you like that sort of story, the kind where you can’t put the book down because you just have to know what happened, then this is a book for you.  The characters are somewhat flat. The plot has flaws—things that make you think, “he never would have done that,” or, “she never would have gone there.” But, if you suspend some disbelief, as is often necessary in these types of books, you will be on the edge of your seat. Chapoton does a good job of using flashbacks to different periods of time to slowly reveal the background of the story and the motivations of the characters.

There’s one thing I have to mention--about drawing the reader into the scene.  I think this book could have done a better job.  One thing that really bugged me through the whole book (and I know it’s a little thing) is that at the beginning of the book Rebecca and her friend are shopping.  Her friend says “look at these. Aren’t they pretty? I have to have them!” (not an exact quote, but close enough.) She takes “them” to the checkout, and then decides I really don’t need “these” and doesn’t buy “them.”  What the heck were they? Earrings? Necklaces? Bookmarks?  How much effort would it have taken to tell the reader? It made me feel disconnected from the story. Put a few of these kinds of scenes together, and you can lose me altogether.
Do you agree? Can you give other examples of little things like this that have bothered you?

Anyway, the book was good.  It’s worth a look, if you like a suspenseful, edge of your seat, plot driven story.

Published by CreateSpace
244 pages
Loaded onto my Kindle from Smashwords.

Rating: 3/5

2 comments:

  1. I find that when I'm tired, stressed or ill, I really need plot driven rather than character driven books. I might buy this one and save it for one of those times.

    I really would recomment 'The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ', I think it would be interesting no matter what viewpoint you read it from.

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  2. Okay, I'm not complaining or anything because I think your blog looks great, but for some reason when I try to bring it up on my work computer I can't see your blog. I can see some of the graphics but none of the writing. It does the same thing with my own blog, whenever i pull it up you can read the writing but the design is completely gone. Anyway, I'm only mentioning this to explain why I haven't been able to comment in a while.

    This book sounded really interesting and so did the other one you wrote about "Matched".

    But to answer your question, for some reason it really bothers me when an author is telling a story about that could take place anywhere or at anytime and then they all of a sudden mention something that dates the book. I don't know if I am explaining this right.

    The book Relentless by Dean Koontz could pretty much take place at any time. So when you are reading it you can get very sucked in, but then out of nowhere he makes some reference to his MC going home to watch Baywatch. The reference has nothing to do with the story, and no where else really in the story does he reference movies or music or tv shows. For me, when I come across something like that it stops me in my tracks and pulls me right out of the plot.

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