It was a gamble for
Eleanor to rejoin humanity, but she was driven to it. She’d been too successful
forgetting. The last vestiges of her family hung by a thread in her transformed
brain and drove her to be reckless. Ten years later, Eleanor hides in plain sight.
She is an average girl getting average grades in a small Wyoming town: poor but
happy, lonely but loved. Her mother, Tabitha, is there for her and that’s all
she’s ever needed. But now her mother is sick and David has returned. The only
friend she’d ever had, the only other person who knows her secret, is back. And
Eleanor again becomes reckless.
Eleanor is a modest
girl, unremarkable but extraordinary, young but old, malleable but fixed. She
is scared and confused. She is a liar and a thief. Eleanor is not what she
appears to be.
Here is my take on this book:
Johnny Worthen reels the reader in like a
fish on a hook, with anticipation and patience, until he has you exactly where
he wants you. With slow, deliberate strokes he introduces Eleanor, a girl on
the outside, monster on the inside, yet more human than most.
Eleanor
The Unseen is not a YA horror in the typical sense
of the word. The novel is more a psychological thriller that takes you into the
mind of a young teenager, showing the monstrous things she is capable of but pairing
them with the human aspect of her psyche.
Worthen reveals Eleanor’s secret at just
the right time, in just the right amounts, never too much, never too little,
never quite satisfying, always teasing, encouraging the reader to turn page
after page after page.
In the end there is a twist, of course. Who
is actually the monster? Who the true-to-heart person with humane qualities? This
I will leave for you to find out.
JOHNNY WORTHEN graduated with a B.A. in English and Master’s
in
American Studies from the University of Utah. After a series
of
businesses and adventures, including running his own bakery,
Worthen
found himself drawn to the only thing he ever wanted to
do—write. And
write he does. When he’s not pounding on his keyboard or
attending
writers conferences, Worthen spends his time with his wife
and two
boys in Sandy, Utah.
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