Review: Daughter of Deep Silence by Carrie Ryan

Thursday, July 16, 2015

Series: N/A
Genres: YA | Contemporary | Thriller
Published: May 26th, 2015
Publisher: Dutton Books for Young Readers
My rating: 
I’m the daughter of murdered parents.
I’m the friend of a dead girl.
I’m the lover of my enemy.
And I will have my revenge.

In the wake of the devastating destruction of the luxury yacht Persephone, just three souls remain to tell its story—and two of them are lying. Only Frances Mace knows the terrifying truth, and she’ll stop at nothing to avenge the murders of everyone she held dear. Even if it means taking down the boy she loves and possibly losing herself in the process.

Sharp and incisive, Daughter of Deep Silence by bestselling author Carrie Ryan is a deliciously smart revenge thriller that examines perceptions of identity, love, and the lengths to which one girl is willing to go when she thinks she has nothing to lose. 


The blurb lies.

This book isn't about "[...] the lengths to which one girl is willing to go when she thinks she has nothing to lose." What this book is about, is a heroine swooning over a guy and tossing aside her plans and rational thoughts for the course of true love. A heroine who is none the badass bitch or the unreliable narrator she desperately wants to be.

I'm going to go ahead and call bullshit on the romance. The characters meet at the age of fourteen and barely know each other for a week before falling in love. After four years, instead of it being among the pile of embarrassing things that happened in their early teen days, their love for each other is still going strong. I mean come on, really? Aight. Maybe this is possible in some Utopian reality out there, but the romance in this book earned more eye rolls from me than anything else since we don't see much connection.

It's also laughable how easily the MC strayed from her path. She knew the guy -  Grey as the enemy - someone potentially involved in mass murder. I just don't understand how the feelings and fantasies and little flutters could be part of the equation. Heck, their feelings can't be healthy in the psychological sense.

The writing itself was enough to give me a migraine with the repetitivity, lack of substance and the fact that telling was prioritized over showing. There are times when the readers just don't need a chorus to jump in and give them certain explanations simply because they are obvious and the readers are not stupid. Frances felt the need to explain her actions and it was like having someone tell you that you'll die if you were stabbed to death. Or watching Dora the Explorer when you're not, like, three.

"I cross my arms over my chest, cupping my elbows in my palms and allowing my shoulders to hunch so that I take up less physical space. It makes me appear vulnerable and weak."

"Painfully.' I hurl the word, dagger sharp, because I'm angry. And hurt. ..."

"My breathing's a bit ragged, my chin trembling as though I'm overwhelmed."

Double that up by a few hundred pages and you have the trailer.

I have neutral feelings towards the flashbacks. I could care less about the MC's conversations with her love interest aboard the ship but  I did like the survival aspect. It was quite cogent and the only time I felt any kind of anything towards anyone in the book.

Another thing is that as far as our MC knows, Grey is hiding dangerous things and is a master of deceptions. Funnily enough, she can tell when he's lying because of the thing he does and he turns pink every other second and stutters and stammers and is basically an all round transparent plastic bag. His character portrayal had the power to kick the unpredictability factor up a few notches but the potential went wasted.

With the way things were, are you sure you can't just look into his eyes and see the truth, Frances dear?

Finally, the rushed ending came along and all the loose ties put my shoelaces to shame. It was also certain I just went through 375 pages of absolute shtako.





descriptionNaban is going through what can only be described as an existential crisis and she blames the rain. She has a love-hate relationship with rain. She also feels weird talking about herself in third person. Oh well.

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