Reviews

Find Me by Romily Bernard

nklosty's review against another edition

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4.0

The thriller part of this was a little lacking. I was held in suspense and led down the wrong road a time or two. Wick and Griff were good characters, and I liked their interactions. However, the rest of the characters felt a bit flat. 88

beastreader's review against another edition

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4.0

Wicket "Wick" and her sister, Lily have found themselves a new home with Todd, and Bren. Their foster parents rescued them from their drug addicted father. Although they may have a new life that does not stop Detective Carson from still checking up on Wick and Lily. In fact, it is pretty much a nightly routine with Carson stopping by in the wee early morning hours. Carson may not know it but Wick is aware of his routine.

Wick receives a strange package. The package consists of her once former best friend, Tessa's diary. In side the diary is a yellow post-it note. It has two words on it..."Find Me". Before Wick can comprehend what the message means, she learns that Tessa is dead. Wick decides to give up the case. That is before she discovers that her sister, Lily is next. Wick is joined by the sexy boy-next-door, Griff.

I had been waiving about whether to pick up a copy of this book or not. I finally decided to give in and check this book out. Ok, so this book turned out to be way better than I thought it would be. It had excitement, realism with the hacking, and a good cast of characters. Can't say as much for the ending as I predicted it all along. When Wick finally figured it out I could not help but gloat at her by thinking "Well duh, it took you long enough".

While I did like the relationship that was blossoming between Wick and Griff, I did not really feel like it was needed. Luckily things between them did not happen until the last third of the story and it was quick. Not every time that a girl or woman needs help does the good guy that helps need to be in love with that person. Still I enjoyed this book and will be keeping my eyes on this author and her next book.

sreilly1's review against another edition

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4.0

Sooo good!!! The plot was so developed and thought out. Was a HUGE page turner (I got it on Christmas and finished it the morning of the 26th). I recommend it to everyone. I loved how the main character was a badass nerd. Nerd power!!!

fengyuseah's review against another edition

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4.0

4.5 stars

It was a really really exciting ride of a book. The suspense was killing me at times, and there were so may twists! I managed to guess the killer, but that was probably due to my natural cynicism oops. The author managed to toe the line between believable and shocking very well, which made it a very interesting read that kept me at the edge of my seat.

The only thing was that I didn't really like how the resolution of all the plot threads seemed slightly rushed at the end, possibly because so much effort was spent building up to the multiple reveals that went off together like fireworks. Otherwise the pacing of the book was great, and I look forward to the other books in the series. Another small thing is that Wick seems to have gotten off scot-free despite obviously doing something wrong - I mean stealing a cop car? Hacking into a public library computer?

Anyway it was a really great book and I recommend it pretty highly :)

sk24's review against another edition

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4.0

Find Me is about a teenage girl, Wick, who has had a pretty crappy life. Her mother committed suicide, her father is an abusive felon, and Wick and her sister have been in and out of several foster homes. Wick is a bit of a negative-Nancy and doesn't believe she can be a better version of herself. She is her father's daughter. So, in her spare time, she hacks. She works by word-of-mouth and hacks into men's lives, as requested by their wives, to uncover the truth about them. But then one day, an unexpected job lands on her doorstep. A diary that belongs to a girl from school who just committed suicide is dropped at Wick's house with a post-it saying "Find Me." Turns out, someone wants Wick to use her hacking skills to investigate who it was that raped and abused Tessa.

Wick is an interesting character. I couldn't help but feel for her, even though she could be rather frustrating at times. She has very low self-esteem and thinks the same thing about herself that other people call her -- that she is "trash." She also has authority issues, which is understandable considering what she has been through, but she feels that adults are useless and she has to do everything on her own. So, that's why, when Tessa's diary lands on her doorstep and she learns that it's even more personal than she initially realized, she takes it into her own hands instead of asking for help from an adult.

The story definitely captured my interest and I wanted to keep reading to find out everything. However, I was able to pick out, pretty early on, who the mystery psychopath was. But, I was captivated by the story and the mystery (because, of course, I didn't know for sure who it was).

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tammy216's review against another edition

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4.0

Find Me is one of those books that keeps you interested from start to finish. Our main character Wick is a hacker and a foster kid. Wick was raised with an abusive, criminal father and a mother who committed suicide. While Wick's sister Lily is determined to make this foster home work Wick is always ready to run and has one foot out the door. When a classmate, Tessa, commits suicide and her dairy is left on Wick's doorstep with a note that says "Find Me" Wick has to decide whether or not she will use her hacking skills to find out who raped and abused Tessa.

Wick is a really interesting character. She trusts no one and is always prepared for the worst. While her sister is bright and optimistic Wick prefers to be realistic. Wick has a very low opinion of herself which is understandable considering the amount of times she is looked down upon or called "trash" throughout the book. The one person who seems to see all the good sides of Wick is Griff, he is the only one who doesn't judge her.

Overall, I really enjoyed the book. Wick was a great main character. I appreciate how smart and savvy she is and I understand her choices and motivations. The only problem I had was that I figured out the mystery pretty early on. I hoped I wasn't right but I was, even so I still enjoyed the book and the reveals as it came to an end. Definitely and enjoyable read for anyone who likes a good mystery and a strong leading character.

weweresotired's review against another edition

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3.0

Find more reviews at The Best Books Ever!

Find Me follows Wick, a teenage hacker transplanted into picturesque suburbia with her sister and a pair of loving foster parents, as she finds herself forced into getting to the truth behind the apparent suicide of Tessa, a girl who used to be her best friend. Along the way, Wick tries to stay out of the reach of a cop who is determined to bring down Wick's fugitive father -- and Wick too, if he has any say in it. Wick's whole life revolves around her little sister Lily, and she is determined to protect her at all costs. Wick and Lily have had a rough life, and while Lily is optimistic that this foster family is finally going to work out, Wick isn't so sure -- she's spent her life running and doesn't quite know how to stop yet.

Unlike a lot of other reviews that I saw on Goodreads and such, I really liked Wick and felt like her reactions were pretty true to her character. She is someone who has a very strong distrust of adults in general and especially authority figures. She's snarky and sarcastic as a defense to keep others from getting too close, but underneath she's carrying a lot of pain. Do I think she would have been way better off had she gone to an adult or the police the second she started getting in over her head? Um, heck yes! Usually the "no, we can't go to an adult!" aspect of YA stories bothers me, but in this case, it was at least in line with Wick's character.

Bernard created a great voice for Wick, who felt like the most fleshed out of all of the characters. Most of the secondary characters seemed a little flat/stereotyped, however. Lily's the bubbly, optimistic younger sibling; Bren and Todd are the well-meaning, clean-cut suburban parents; Lauren is the popular girl who's still friends with Wick; there's a bunch of mean girls and their jock dude friends, etc. For as well-defined as Wick's voice was, the rest of the cast seemed to be lacking and kind of unmemorable at times. Also, I wasn't sold on the romance between Wick and Griff. The story would have worked if they were friends and not suddenly, occasionally kind of creepily, making out. I went back and forth on whether or not I though Griff was a total d-bag jerk or not; he was really hard to get a read on. Also, I don't know many teenage boys, especially kind of rough-and-tumble guys like Griff, who would spout off with lines about how "I've wanted you for three years" and such. For as real as I felt Wick's voice was, I felt a little put off almost every time Griff showed up.

I feel like Find Me is a good book that could have easily been a great book, but which didn't quite get there for me. It has all of the elements of an awesome mystery/thriller, but it could have been better. Bernard writes some great tense scenes, particularly the last few chapters, but the rest of the book was so seemingly methodical and slower paced that it felt jarring. The story is self contained, but the epilogue sets things up for a sequel. I think Bernard has great promise as a writer, so I'll probably keep an eye out for whatever she comes up with next.

kaitrosereads's review against another edition

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3.0

Find Me, Romily Bernard’s debut novel, has been garnering some high praise from reviewers lately. I went in with very high expectations and I think my expectations were maybe a little too high. While I enjoyed the story, I didn’t love it like I had hoped. It’s a good addition to the YA suspense genre but nothing too spectacular.

I wasn’t drawn into Wick’s story like I had hoped to be. For a suspense novel, it wasn’t all that suspenseful. I kept reading hoping for the pace to pick up but it took way longer than I felt it should have. I wasn’t all that interested in the story until the very end. I didn’t feel invested in any of the outcomes and I only really kept reading to see how things would turn out and if I could guess who the killer was.

As for that, I’ll give Romily Bernard points for keeping me guessing until the very end. I never actually figured out who the killer was. Romily Bernard does a great job and throwing in some red herrings and keeping readers on their toes. There’s more to the story than first meets the eye and I did really like that about Find Me.

The characters were mediocre, at best. Wick was cool. Her talent for hacking was really awesome and something you don’t read about a lot. However, I felt that she could have been doing a lot more with her hacking skills than just helping people find out if their spouses were cheating. I was a little let down by that. Her sister, Lily, seemed very immature and naïve. Wick did everything to protect Lily but I felt that Lily was old enough to know at least a little about protecting herself. She blindly trusted people. With her past, you would think she would know better than to do that. As for the romance between Wick and fellow hacker, Griff, it was cute but nothing that really caught my interest. They didn’t really have much chemistry.

Overall, Find Me is good for a rainy day read but nothing super awesome. I’ll look out for Romily Bernard’s future books (including the sequel to this one) but I feel that this is one that could be skipped over.

joyousreads132's review against another edition

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4.0

In My Own Words:

Wick Tate has always look out for two people in her life: herself and her sister. Being bounced around the foster care system is no picnic at the park but for once, they've actually found a good home. Foster parents who seem decent enough, they have clothes on their backs and a home beyond anything they could ever envisioned for themselves. But Wick is grounded enough to know that nothing good ever lasts so she has to make sure there's a plan set for when the other shoe drops. Especially when no one seems to know the location of their abusive, criminal father.

She hacks for a living - a superhero of sort that saves women from cheating husbands for a fee. All incognito, of course. So when she gets a mysterious package on her doorstep, she senses that someone out there knows how she makes money. To her horror, the package contains the diary of one former best friend, Tessa Waye. And while looking inside she finds a two-word message: FIND ME. The talk at the school the next day is how Tessa supposedly jumped off a building much like Wick's mom. Left with no other choice but to find out the reason why she's left with Tessa's diary, she sets out a mission that would lead her to Tessa's killer.

My Thoughts:

I think I mentioned in my brief review that this book was predictable. I mean the mystery surrounding Tessa's suicide wasn't that hard to solve once you're about 15-20 pages in. The diary, even though, it offered a perspective on Tessa's state of mind, lacked a certain urgency or even a sense of terror for the way her life was spiralling out of control. It hinted a lot of the killer's identity as well, so the fact-finding was almost redundant by the time you move on to chapter five (give or take).

Wick's character shows a lot of chutzpah, which I adore. She's a tiny bundle of sarcasm, wit and inane ability to find trouble. But that's part of her repertoire of charms, if you ask me. I love the way she buys herself time and bullshits her way out of sticky situations. She's loyal and devoted to her sister's well-being but she's very wary of everyone that showed even a tiny iota of tenderness.

Griff is the token boy interest. I also adore him, though there was a certain predictability to his character as well.

Over all, I think Find Me was enjoyable enough. Regardless of how quickly I unraveled its mysteries, I was interested enough to see it through the end. It hardly made you think nor would you have to search your soul for answers but some days, books like Find Me is just what you need.

lcmarie19's review against another edition

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4.0

Very interesting story. There are a few questions that I still have, but it's definitely worthy of an above average rating.

When I initially started this book, I wasn't sure how I felt about Wick or Lily. Wick, in my opinion, was already too extreme and Lily was just too passive. In that regard, they make a good sibling duo. Lily kept Wick in check and Wick kept Lily rational. But it took me until half of the book to really tolerate Wick. Griff, my favorite character (next to Lauren & Todd), was a great guy. He was witty, he was brave, he was a high school boy tryng to do a grown man's work. I think, for 300 pages, his character develops quite well.

Now, the mystery throughout the book was very intriguing. I kept wanting to know who did it? Why did they do it? And while those questions were answered, I also felt like the book was too short to properly contextualize everything. I would have liked more back story on Tessa, as opposed to basic exposition. It just kind of came out of nowhere for me. But Bernard did a great job in 300 pages, I just wish the book was about 100 pages longer.

I fail to understand how and why Wick was suspicious of Officer Carson, other than the fact that he was after her for her hacking skills that she constantly exploited to make money. In the beginning of the book, she paints a specific picture of him and then by the end, it's a different picture. Granted, that's supposed to happen in books; perspectives change once the proper knowledge is gathered. I guess my concern is that I couldn't see how the initial assumption was valid. Unless, I missed that part in the book.

Bren was a quiet character, to me. She wasn't a favorite, but she wasn't a least favorite. By the end of the book, I am slight more curious about her as a person, and I'm hoping that'll be address in the next book.

Another thing that grated my nerves -- just a bit -- was Wick's passivity when it came to bullies (people bullying her) and then when it came to standing it for her sister, she was all aggressive about it. I couldn't stand how Wick didn't stand up for herself! Griff had to do it. Not often, but enough to where I found myself wondering about this girl. Also, she made a lot of stupid decisions that Lauren AND Lily both told her were stupid. Hindsight is definitely 20/20 but in WIck's case, Come on! Wick is definitely a product of her upbringing -- her father is very unpleasant, as is Joe -- so I try to be lenient in my developing perception of her.

I know I'm sounding like I had more issues with the story than non-issues, which is not the case. This is definitely a book that keeps you on the edge of your seat. You're constantly questioning all of the characters, everyone is a suspect for a moment. Everyone has something to hide. I would find myself reading 50 pages, then I would try to put the book down and found that I couldn't. It is fast-paced, well developed, and chilling. The crimes that are committed in the book are very realistic, which makes it even worse! But in a good way.

Because this is the first of a trilogy, the ending is a bit of a cliffhanger. But not in the way that you'd think. I will be continuing the series and can't wait to see what Wick gets into next.