Foreshadowed
About
I can't avoid the dark forever. Electricity goes out. Light bulb burns out. The sun sets every evening. Darkness is inevitable. I'm going to die.
Hope Murdoch was born dead. She took a breath two minutes later and now is an almost-normal sixteen-year-old. Normal: a hopeless crush on the boy next door, a negative body image, and a (mis)diagnosis of ADHD. Not-so-normal: an exhausting and distracting ability to read minds. High school is hard enough without hearing what everyone really thinks of you.
Lance Hampton used to be normal until a car accident killed him and his parents. Paramedics brought him back to a life he doesn’t want: orphaned, uprooted, living with his uncle, and suddenly able to see how people die. At his new school, he tries to keep to himself. Seeing how complete strangers die is torture enough, let alone friends.
At first glance, Hope doesn’t think much of Lance (though a lot of the other girls do). He looks like the typical bad boy. No thank-you…but then she meets his eyes and everything goes dark. She hears labored breathing. Rapid footsteps. And then a thud as someone falls to the ground. Inside Lance’s head, Hope just witnessed a vision of murder…her own.
Together, Hope and Lance try to catch a killer before he’s red-handed. A killer who could be anywhere. Anyone. Sure Hope can read minds and Lance can see death, but they still can’t see in the dark.
Praise for this book
Haven’t we all secretly wished we had the ability to read minds back when we were in high school? What could go wrong? Holly Campbell’s Foreshadowed is a young adult thriller based on that very ability. The characters were consistent and superb. I felt like I knew some of them in high school. The story was meticulous and a thriller slow burn that starts easy enough but slowly built until I couldn’t put it down. I feel like I read the last twenty pages in seconds. I like Stephen King, Cujo, and Thinner, for the same reason. Holly M. Campbell is a master storyteller and now one of my new favorite writers.
The best teen paranormal thriller I’ve read in a long time. It’s well-written, equally dark as it is funny, with a truly brilliant premise and a unique and interesting narrator. The story centers around Hope, a high school junior who can read minds. This aspect of the story is well-done; the reader quickly understands both the downside and perks of Hope’s ability, and can empathize with her being considered a social outcast as such. However, Hope soon learns she’s not alone in the realm of paranormal abilities when she meets Lance, a new classmate with the ability to see how a person will die when he looks them in the eye. Since Hope can read minds, she sees her death in Lance’s thoughts when they meet. Eventually, the two will team together to try and stop her death – and the deaths of others. Isn’t that such a freakin’ cool premise?! I think it’s brilliant. And the story delivers. I love Hope and Lance; they are both parts realistic and unusual, darkly funny and their banter felt natural. Even the secondary characters are complex, believable, and interesting to read about – especially Bryce, Hope’s shallow but caring next-door neighbor. If you like teen paranormal thrillers with a dark edge, murder mysteries, and suspenseful books that are seamless and effortless to keep reading without putting down, I can’t recommend Foreshadowed enough.