REVIEW for Light of Day

Thank you to the wonderful people at Harper Teen for this copy of the book.

TITLE:                 Light of Day

AUTHOR:            Allison Van Diepen

GENRE:                YA

RATING:              4 Stars

I am a huge fan of this author's work, basically having read every book she has ever written. While I did not know this before reading it, this book follows up the first book in this series (albeit very minimally) - which was a nice touch.

Gabby is a wonderful main character. At first, I thought she was headed into the "usual" bitchy rebelling against my parents, but this was not the case. She was smart, goal oriented and a fun character. She wants a career in radio, she wants a shot at her passion. She has friends, who, in the end turn out not to be that friendly, but she also does not let things get her down - loved her.

Basically. this is the story of Gabby who finds herself in a difficult situation, while trying to save her friend(s) two of them actually. In the process, she meets X who will help her grow, but at the same time come with his own baggage.

The storyline was both horrific and unfortunately, all too realistic in today's world - which is something this author covers extremely well. The book is well crafted and the storyline moves at a quick pace (yay!). The one comment I have is that I felt as though Van Dipien caved into the "tied into a pretty bow" too much. Her earlier work WAS edgier and not quite as cute as this story.

This book was an odd mixture of topical issues faced smack on while at the same time being a little too "perfect". It made me feel a little unfulfilled at the end.