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Book Review: Papina, Katie Hamstead

Papina

Title: Papina
Author: Katie Hamstead
Published: 05/07/2015
Pages: 301
Source: Netgalley
Format: Ebook
Rating: 3/5
Forrest and Braydon Miller moved to the small town of Papina to follow their dreams and start a family. Braydon loves her new life in the quiet town, kept alie by the prestigious boarding school overlooking the valley. She is so proud of her husband's work, helping the teens on the reservation.
Until one day, Forrest doesn't come home.
Scandal spreads when one of the teenagers is found missing, too. But Braydon refuses to believe her husband would leave her. When the teen is found, she isn't talking - literally.
While Braydon's heart is breaking, she needs to hold her crumbling life together, raise her son, and find a way to love the teenaget enough to find the truth of what happened to her husband.

Papina is an enjoyable read which although a mystery was quite unique as it also deals with love, loss, and race. The story did start off a bit too slow and cheesy for me. Forrest and Braydon are extremely sickly sweet with each other and it felt like their relationship was far too perfect to be anything like a real relationship. However, and it sounds cruel to say this, the story got so much better (and realistic) after Forrest disappeared. But that is the whole basis of the story so it's all good.

The story is told from Braydon's perspective. Braydon's feelings are conveyed to the reader perfectly, especially her confusion, worry and grief when Forrest goes missing and then her struggles to "get over him" (for lack of a better term). I think this is supposed to make the reader really feel for her as if they are in her shoes. But although I did feel sorry for Braydon, I wouldn't say my heart was breaking.

The characters were okay, but I've seen children act more mature that many of them. Honestly, the majority of characters are in their mid-twenties to thirties and there was more drama than a teen movie. There was so much unnecessary fighting and bitchiness during what would be the hardest time of Braydon's life. There didn't need to be any more drama in her life. It kind of felt like drama for the sake of drama.

I will say that Papina is a pretty unpredictable story. I had two suspects in mind whilst reading and it was neither of them. The real culprit didn't even cross my mind. Therefore, I feel this was brilliantly written by Katie Hamstead. It was logical, but the plot still twisted enough so that I wasn't sure what would develop next. And despite all the drama the story did progress at quite a nice pace. The ending was also climatic and complete with all plot points were tied up nicely.

Overall, Papina was a nice read but not my favourite by Katie Hamstead. I would recommend Papina to those who like mysteries with a bit of chick lit. I will most definitely be reading more by Katie Hamstead too.




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