Who doesn't like a good mystery/thriller book? I don't know anyone! It's just the tension you feel when you want to figure what had happened, who had done it, that feeling when you find out and you're so shocked! Oh! I love it.
So when I saw an opportunity to read a book called 52 Likes by Medeia Sharif, I knew I needed to have the book in my life. Just look at this premise, it sounds amazing!
After a brutal rape and near-murder, Valerie wants to get past feelings of victimhood from both the assault and her history of being bullied. Not knowing the identity of her masked rapist and dealing with the nasty rumors about that night are two things that plague her daily.
Valerie will have to follow ghostly entities, past victims of the rapist-murderer, contacting her through a social media site. Why do all of their eerie photos have 52 likes under them? Their messages are leading her to the mystery man, although he'll put up a fight to remain hidden.
(taken from Goodreads)
So, as we found out from the premise, the book starts with the rape scene. Valerie is a young girl that had made some mistakes in her life. And now, she has done the biggest yet - she went to a wrong house and got raped.
How can Valerie deal with this? Being raped is one of the worst things that can happen to a girl. Of course, nobody ever thinks it will happen to them.
But there are some clues to the case and Valerie follows them. Morover, the clues seem to lead to a kind of supernatural twist. Wow, that's interesting.
I mean, this book has a huuuge potential. The topic Shariff dealt with is amazing, I was so pumped to read this book. Rape, young girl, something supernatural, mystery,... you know, it sounds so gripping!
Unfortunately, I don't think that the potential was used fully. I cannot imagine what rape victims are going through. I really cannot and honestly, I don't even want to. But Valerie's behaviour seemed very implausible in some times. She was ready to go to school, she dealt with very superficial things and honestly, I couldn't connect with her.
Other things I didn't enjoy very much was the supernatural twist. I mean, it's written in the premise of the book, so it's not a spoiler. I do believe that without this twist the book would be better. More mysterious, more unique. With this some things just seemed rushed - like seriously, if you want ghost entities helping to solve tha case, it should be more difficult for them. Maybe they shouldn't be able to send private messages via social networks. But what do I know, I don't get to know any ghostly entities. Lucky me!
Also, the dealing with the communication about the actual rape was weird. Valerie doesn't want to tell her brother because he might freak out... undestandably. But then she tells her friend like it would be quite casual thing.
And!! The school Valerie attends is super annoying! The kids basically bully everyone and the teachers are cool with that! And the counselor... why do you have counselor that doesn't counsel? That seems like a very useful thing.
To sum it up, as you can imagine, I started reading this book with huge expectations. I was a little bit disappointed. That doesn't mean the book is bad. It reads super quickly and it is gripping! The topic is very interesting and I like reading about something serious in YA literature. I just had some problems with it. But I wouldn't be against reading some other books byl Medeia Sharif. I can imagine her books.
I received a digital copy from NetGalley in exchange for my review. Thank you NetGalley and Evernight Teen!
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