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A review by audreychamaine
Hysteria by Megan Miranda
3.0
I was a big fan of Megan Miranda's debut novel, Fracture, so I jumped at the chance to read her latest book, Hysteria. While I didn't enjoy it as much as Fracture, Hysteria was a solid novel and had some really creepy elements to it, which is what attracted me to Miranda's writing in the first place.
From the very beginning, we get a dark, incomplete picture of the home life of main character Mallory. Her parents seem to be afraid of her, avoiding her and sending her away to a boarding school. You can't really blame them, though, because Mallory murdered her boyfriend in her kitchen. No charges were pressed because it was deemed to be self-defense, but Mallory has incomplete memories about that night and about what exactly happened. If you killed somebody defending yourself, wouldn't it be better to remember it? It makes sense to get out of Dodge, though, because the friends of the dead boyfriend are harassing her and the mother is stalking her. Tension drips from these pages, darkness pulses. I was hooked from the first sentence.
There's a possible paranormal bent to this story, but it could also be explained away as part of Mallory's compromised psyche. She hears pounding, and an injury begins physically manifesting itself on her body. Mallory's convinced her dead boyfriend's ghost is haunting her, and as the story progresses, these occurrences build to a climax. Additionally, a boy at her new boarding school turns up murdered, and all eyes look toward Mallory as the lead suspect.
Unfortunately, the final part of the book didn't result in the kind of payoff I was hoping for. I felt like the ending was strangely rushed, and there was a stereotypical big reveal from the bad guy. I don't get why they always need to explain everything, other than it's an easy way to do a massive info-dump to deliver the "eureka" moment to the main character.
Although I didn't care for Hysteria as much as Fracture, I still think many readers will enjoy the dark atmosphere and creep factor of a character who may slowly be losing her mind.
From the very beginning, we get a dark, incomplete picture of the home life of main character Mallory. Her parents seem to be afraid of her, avoiding her and sending her away to a boarding school. You can't really blame them, though, because Mallory murdered her boyfriend in her kitchen. No charges were pressed because it was deemed to be self-defense, but Mallory has incomplete memories about that night and about what exactly happened. If you killed somebody defending yourself, wouldn't it be better to remember it? It makes sense to get out of Dodge, though, because the friends of the dead boyfriend are harassing her and the mother is stalking her. Tension drips from these pages, darkness pulses. I was hooked from the first sentence.
There's a possible paranormal bent to this story, but it could also be explained away as part of Mallory's compromised psyche. She hears pounding, and an injury begins physically manifesting itself on her body. Mallory's convinced her dead boyfriend's ghost is haunting her, and as the story progresses, these occurrences build to a climax. Additionally, a boy at her new boarding school turns up murdered, and all eyes look toward Mallory as the lead suspect.
Unfortunately, the final part of the book didn't result in the kind of payoff I was hoping for. I felt like the ending was strangely rushed, and there was a stereotypical big reveal from the bad guy. I don't get why they always need to explain everything, other than it's an easy way to do a massive info-dump to deliver the "eureka" moment to the main character.
Although I didn't care for Hysteria as much as Fracture, I still think many readers will enjoy the dark atmosphere and creep factor of a character who may slowly be losing her mind.