3rd Quarter Outside Reading Book Review

 
No Place Like Home By Mary Higgins Clark. Simon & Schuster 2005   Genre: Fiction

“In No Place Like Home, the main character named Liza Barton killed her mother accidentally, while trying to save her from her stepfather. She then injured her stepfather with the pistol. She was 10 when this happened, and after a trail, she was acquitted. 24 years later her second husband purchases her the same home where the murders took place. Liza, who changed her name to Ceila, is harassed, and then the people around her start being killed. She is determined to prove her innocence secretly, and stay alive.   

“ Mary Higgins Clark [possesses an] awesome gift for storytelling… A cunning variation on the haunted-house theme.” –The New York Times

Mary Higgins Clark leaves you wanting to keep reading in this book, and in all the other pieces she has written. In No Place Like Home, she never lets the reader know who the criminal or murderer is, and lets them use their imagination until the climax and resolution in reached, or to think of a possible ending of their own. She then finds a thrilling climax which usually has a very dramatic twist on the whole story, and something will happen that the reader never expected. Mary Higgins Clark also used a lot of foreshadowing, because the main character’s past was what the whole story was based on.
Also in No Place Like Home, the author shows the mood very well. The setting is not always that clear, but the scenes and events that happen are. An example of an image that she described very good was when the house had been vandalized. 3rd person is used which allows you to know what almost all of the characters are thinking. This controls the tone of the story.

“My mother’s eyes were lighter, a sapphire blue, picture perfect with her golden hair. My hair would be dark blonde if I left it natural.” pg. 6

I chose this book because I enjoy reading books my Mary Higgins Clark. She has very good plots and themes to her book which encourage the reader not to put the book down. They usually are somewhat thrilling, and almost always have something to do with murder or a crime, but that is what makes her writing different and very interesting. Some of my favorite books are pieces that she has written, like Two Girls in Blue.