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Shift
A psychological thriller with a hint of the paranormal, Shift is perfect for fans of Mary E. Pearson and Lois Duncan.
The rumor mill is spinning when Miranda Vaile arrives at school along with whispers that she murdered her parents. But Olive Corbett wants nothing to do with the new girl. After "the incident," Olive's been the subject of too much gossip, and now she just wants to take her pills and stay under the radar.
But even from the sidelines, there's no ignoring the fact that there's something not quite right about Miranda. How can this mousy girl step right into the popular group, become the queen bee's best friend, and slowly seize control herself? It's almost parasitic.
But who would ever believe crazy Olive, the girl who has a habit of letting her imagination run away with her? And what if Olive is Miranda's next target?
Also available in hardcover (978-1-60684-358-1) and electronic book (978-1-60684-359-8) formats.
The rumor mill is spinning when Miranda Vaile arrives at school along with whispers that she murdered her parents. But Olive Corbett wants nothing to do with the new girl. After "the incident," Olive's been the subject of too much gossip, and now she just wants to take her pills and stay under the radar.
But even from the sidelines, there's no ignoring the fact that there's something not quite right about Miranda. How can this mousy girl step right into the popular group, become the queen bee's best friend, and slowly seize control herself? It's almost parasitic.
But who would ever believe crazy Olive, the girl who has a habit of letting her imagination run away with her? And what if Olive is Miranda's next target?
Also available in hardcover (978-1-60684-358-1) and electronic book (978-1-60684-359-8) formats.
304 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2011
86 people are currently reading
4794 people want to read
About the author
Em Bailey
3 books165 followersEm Bailey is an Australian living in Germany where, despite having been a vegetarian for many years, she now enjoys the occasional Wurst. Em used to be a new-media designer for a children’s television production house and is now a full-time author. Shift is her first YA novel, although she has written a number of books for children under the name Meredith Badger.
When she’s not writing, Em is generally getting lost, losing stuff, reading, hanging out with her friends and family, and listening to Radiolab podcasts. Like Olive, she doesn’t like leggings that look like jeans, but has no problem with tofu schnitzels.
When she’s not writing, Em is generally getting lost, losing stuff, reading, hanging out with her friends and family, and listening to Radiolab podcasts. Like Olive, she doesn’t like leggings that look like jeans, but has no problem with tofu schnitzels.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 630 reviews
October 1, 2011
Wow. This book practically threw me off balance. The story itself is amazing with a lot of twists and turns. If you've read my IMM 25, you would probably know that this book is soaked wet, and I spent hours drying it. And that was when I couldn't help but took a peek... and instantly, I was hooked.
Our main character Olive is a beautiful, witty, sarcastic but problematic teenage girl. Ever since her father left, she has not been the same as her old self. She is convinced that she is the reason of her father's leaving and she blames herself for it. Her best friend is a sensible and logical girl, Ami who also suffered a similar family tragedy.
Then, a newbie comes to school - Miranda Vaile's her name. Rumors are flying around that Miranda killed her parents. And Olive is intrigued. When she discovers Miranda's strange behaviour and Google it online, she found a shocking word: shape-shifter. A shape-shifter is said to be an organism that sticks onto its host and drain his/her life force away. Olive doesn't know whether this is true, but evidences are pointing towards it.
What is so great about this book, you ask?
1. The blurring of the fine line between fantasy and reality. Yes, this is a modern-day young adult novel, set in a normal place in a normal country. BUT, the author's words seem to gravitate towards the paranormal at times and then back to the real world. And guess what? I myself am not sure about it! Oh, how I love books that make me guess.
2. Oddities and Disturbing Behaviors. Olive gets paranoid about Miranda's getting close to her ex-best friend Katie, and fears that Miranda is really a shapeshifter as Miranda slowly takes on the shape of Katie herself while Katie slowly shrinks and becomes a 'skeleton'. Before that, Miranda was fascinated by Katie - she imitates the way Katie walks, talks and wears. She was always murmuring lines - words that are previously spoken by Katie herself. At this point, I was really worried that Miranda is crazy. But then, tidbits are revealed about Olive herself, and I started to question her sanity as well. There, the author makes me doubtful again.
3. Quirky Romance. A real hottie/nice guy/liveguard, Lachlan becomes interested in Olive, and while she does like him, she is self conscious of her current status as the school's pariah and also her dark past. She tries her best to make him go away even though in her heart, she really, really likes him. But Lachlan has no interest in the pretty, typical cheerleader-type girls in school. He's only interested in Olive. Later, he becomes Olives anchor to sanity in a rough, stormy ocean.
4. Twists and Turns. The author cleverly spun a thriller based on a devious plot, and I, the pleasantly surprised reader, shall happily applaud her for it. I was outsmarted more than once - can I use that word? - and not even once I did not go, What? OMG.
5. Flawed Characters. What I appreciate about flawed characters is that they are real people that makes mistakes, have problems and are sometimes troubled by events in life. They may not be perfect or dream-like or posses super powers, but they are true-to-life.
6. Writing Style. The author tells the story with ease and adeptness. The words are simple and easy to read, but at the same time, it also portrays the author's unique writing style. I like how the author describes some of the personal traits of the characters, they felt so real that I can't help but imagine what they are like.
7. High on The Creepiness Factor. Don't let yourself be fooled. This book is not what you think. Symptoms after reading include: fear, minor discomfort and a high admiration for the author's brilliant mind.
I hope these seven reasons are enough to convince you that Shift is indeed a highly exceptional, gripping and engrossing debut in the sea of young adult books. If you want a fresh breathe from the usual teen romance, vampires, werewolves and shape-shifters, go read Shift. Mark my words: You won't regret reading it.
http://the-bookaholics.blogspot.com/
Our main character Olive is a beautiful, witty, sarcastic but problematic teenage girl. Ever since her father left, she has not been the same as her old self. She is convinced that she is the reason of her father's leaving and she blames herself for it. Her best friend is a sensible and logical girl, Ami who also suffered a similar family tragedy.
Then, a newbie comes to school - Miranda Vaile's her name. Rumors are flying around that Miranda killed her parents. And Olive is intrigued. When she discovers Miranda's strange behaviour and Google it online, she found a shocking word: shape-shifter. A shape-shifter is said to be an organism that sticks onto its host and drain his/her life force away. Olive doesn't know whether this is true, but evidences are pointing towards it.
What is so great about this book, you ask?
1. The blurring of the fine line between fantasy and reality. Yes, this is a modern-day young adult novel, set in a normal place in a normal country. BUT, the author's words seem to gravitate towards the paranormal at times and then back to the real world. And guess what? I myself am not sure about it! Oh, how I love books that make me guess.
2. Oddities and Disturbing Behaviors. Olive gets paranoid about Miranda's getting close to her ex-best friend Katie, and fears that Miranda is really a shapeshifter as Miranda slowly takes on the shape of Katie herself while Katie slowly shrinks and becomes a 'skeleton'. Before that, Miranda was fascinated by Katie - she imitates the way Katie walks, talks and wears. She was always murmuring lines - words that are previously spoken by Katie herself. At this point, I was really worried that Miranda is crazy. But then, tidbits are revealed about Olive herself, and I started to question her sanity as well. There, the author makes me doubtful again.
3. Quirky Romance. A real hottie/nice guy/liveguard, Lachlan becomes interested in Olive, and while she does like him, she is self conscious of her current status as the school's pariah and also her dark past. She tries her best to make him go away even though in her heart, she really, really likes him. But Lachlan has no interest in the pretty, typical cheerleader-type girls in school. He's only interested in Olive. Later, he becomes Olives anchor to sanity in a rough, stormy ocean.
4. Twists and Turns. The author cleverly spun a thriller based on a devious plot, and I, the pleasantly surprised reader, shall happily applaud her for it. I was outsmarted more than once - can I use that word? - and not even once I did not go, What? OMG.
5. Flawed Characters. What I appreciate about flawed characters is that they are real people that makes mistakes, have problems and are sometimes troubled by events in life. They may not be perfect or dream-like or posses super powers, but they are true-to-life.
6. Writing Style. The author tells the story with ease and adeptness. The words are simple and easy to read, but at the same time, it also portrays the author's unique writing style. I like how the author describes some of the personal traits of the characters, they felt so real that I can't help but imagine what they are like.
7. High on The Creepiness Factor. Don't let yourself be fooled. This book is not what you think. Symptoms after reading include: fear, minor discomfort and a high admiration for the author's brilliant mind.
I hope these seven reasons are enough to convince you that Shift is indeed a highly exceptional, gripping and engrossing debut in the sea of young adult books. If you want a fresh breathe from the usual teen romance, vampires, werewolves and shape-shifters, go read Shift. Mark my words: You won't regret reading it.
http://the-bookaholics.blogspot.com/
August 7, 2012
1.5 stars
Easily my biggest disappointment of 2012 so far.
I was so excited for "Shift." So excited. I love psychological thrillers and horror novels, and "Shift" sounded like it had a nice combination of both. Besides, look at that amazing cover! It's beautiful and so evocative and creepy.
I read it quickly. I'll give Bailey that. But, in all fairness, I was on a five-hour flight home from Turkey.
The only thing that saved it from a one-star rating was a twist at the halfway point that I totally didn't see coming, which was amazing because it is nowhere near a new twist, and I was totally impressed at how well Bailey managed to hide it from me.
Everything else I despised.
It's made even worse by the fact that, on paper, I should love this novel. I should be giving it 5 stars and applauding its brilliance, imagination and creepy factor. All of those things are totally absent.
It's a shape-shifter novel where a kind of emotional vampirism from the teenage girl villain, Miranda, is a metaphor for an eating disorder (she literally wastes away Olive's ex-best friend, Katie), bullying (she does this mostly through psychological takeover) and teenage-girl cliques, where Miranda spends the first half of the novel moving into Katie's life, driving away all her other friends, playing on Katie, an aspiring model's, insecurity and body image issues in order to trigger severe anorexia, until Katie has an emotional breakdown and Miranda, who has blossomed from a drab nobody (literally - she seems to have no physical form) to a magnetic and charming beauty queen, finishes her off by betraying Katie and seducing her boyfriend multiple times.
That is not going under spoiler tags because a) it's about 30% of the novel and b) it's totally, blindingly obvious.
Now, I know what you guys are thinking, because I'm psychic and awesome like that.
Doesn't Katie sound like she should be the main character?
Well, I hear you. (Even if that's not what you were saying...shhh!). There are books in which having an otherwise secondary character as an observer should work well, like The Secret History. "Shift" is not at all like that, given that Olive and Katie rarely to never interact, and when they do, it's in cliches and trophes - "no-please-you-have-to-believe-me", "I-just-want-to-be-beautiful", "God, Olive, why don't you lose some weight and stop being so crazy?!" - so that it's impossible to care about what will happen to Katie. Not only that, but the writing in "Shift" is among some of the clumsiest I've ever read (yes, I'm aware that this review is clumsily-written, too). Bailey really needs a lesson in "show don't tell", because there are walls of text that simply seem to go like:
"Katie let Miranda borrow her headphones. Miranda started wearing the headphones all the time. Katie stopped hanging out with her other friends. It was just her and her boyfriend and Miranda. Miranda was starting to look blonder. She kind of looked like Katie. Katie started to look pale. Katie was losing weight and I was worried about her."
There's no deduction, no room for the reader to engage his/her brain, we're just led along by the hand and told how each thing happened. The foregone-conclusion aspect of this could have been creepy, but it wasn't because of the wooden and drab writing, and the fact that it's not just foregone, it's unbelievably obvious. Everything about Miranda is weird and evil from day one. There is also bizarre overuse of the word "lush", which seems to show up on every page.
It was as if Bailey had a checklist of things that she wanted to write in the novel and she was just putting them down on the page without really thinking about whether they would be interesting or enjoyable, because she really wanted to get to the end, damn it! At some points, it feels almost like reading an outline for a scene that Bailey wanted to write later.
Never fear if you think the novel should have been told from Katie's perspective, though. After half the novel has beenwasted spent on Olive drably observing Katie's breakdown from the outside, which also has a foregone-conclusion air to it.
Bailey then rinses, shakes and repeats the whole plot.
Yes, seriously. Miranda moves on from Katie and onto Olive, deciding that she will use her magic magneticism to seduce a singer that Olive loves and take her to clothes stores to show off how much better-looking Miranda is than Olive, in the hopes that this will also drive Olive into a similar suicidal and sick state.
And, for some reason, it works.
The second half of this novel is one of the weirdest and trippiest things I've ever read. There's absolutely no psychological consistency. Olive has spent 50% of the book convinced that Miranda is some kind of succubus, sucking the life out of Katie and ultimately responsible for her death. Olive even sees her yawn at Katie's memorial service (this is presented as though it is a heinous thing so it's not just like Miranda got a bit uncontrollably tired, it's obviously done with malice).
Yet when Miranda bubbles up to Olive and starts talking about Olive's favourite band, Olive doesn't tell Miranda to piss off. She plays along eagerly, a totally random and inexplicable shfit in character that does not seem remotely intentional on Bailey's part. It's like Olive hit her head and forgot all about Miranda's supposed eeeeevil, because apparently Olive trusts Miranda enough to sneak out of her house to go see a band with her and buddies up with her to such an extent that they are sharing clothes and Olive feels sorry for her when Miranda burbles about her parents' death. There's no sense that Olive is being forced or manipulated to feel the way she does - she just does. But, since Miranda is blatantly evil from her first appearance to her last, it's impossible for the reader to feel anywhere near as swept up in Miranda's "charm" as we're supposed to believe Olive is.
Plus, for a murderous succubus, Miranda's methods seem to be kind of weak. Even worse, though, was that this book didn't even seem to be trying to deliver the creepy factor. As part of Miranda's quest to take over Katie's life, she takes away Katie's one treat - a choc-ice at the cinema - and gives her a bottle of water instead. Katie is apparently so psychologically dominated by Miranda that this one wordless action is enough to make her take the water and go away. Olive is so incensed that she goes into the cinema to give Katie the choc-ice - and finds Katie's boyfriend with his arm around Miranda! *gasp* And then Miranda smiles. We're in thriller cliche area here, and Bailey can't even deliver the thrills.
How is it possible for a novel to feel formulaic of itself? I don't know, and I know how confusing that sounds, but that's how I felt with "Shift." It's 300ish pages, but when Miranda started flirting with the band member that she thought Olive loved, I was like "oh, it's Katie all over again...standard "Shift" format..." which is crazy! It's insanely predictable, too, especially when it becomes clear (to everyone except Miranda) that Olive loves the band member's "hero type" half-brother, instead of the band-member himself.
Something that made me laugh because I'm a horrible person: the "incident" is She spends a disproportionate period of time trying to hide this from the reader, which made me scoff because it seemed immediately obvious to me what was going on. The logistics of what happened really are a something amazingly awful to behold, illogical and random, bordering on unintentional humour:
Also, the ending is horrendous, and it shows how utterly generic and unoriginal the entire novel was. It’s a depressing ending, but Bailey is so tone-deaf that she appears unable to see that.
The summing up word for this book has to be disappointment. So much potential and such a great premise, totally wasted.
Easily my biggest disappointment of 2012 so far.
I was so excited for "Shift." So excited. I love psychological thrillers and horror novels, and "Shift" sounded like it had a nice combination of both. Besides, look at that amazing cover! It's beautiful and so evocative and creepy.
I read it quickly. I'll give Bailey that. But, in all fairness, I was on a five-hour flight home from Turkey.
The only thing that saved it from a one-star rating was a twist at the halfway point that I totally didn't see coming, which was amazing because it is nowhere near a new twist, and I was totally impressed at how well Bailey managed to hide it from me.
Everything else I despised.
It's made even worse by the fact that, on paper, I should love this novel. I should be giving it 5 stars and applauding its brilliance, imagination and creepy factor. All of those things are totally absent.
It's a shape-shifter novel where a kind of emotional vampirism from the teenage girl villain, Miranda, is a metaphor for an eating disorder (she literally wastes away Olive's ex-best friend, Katie), bullying (she does this mostly through psychological takeover) and teenage-girl cliques, where Miranda spends the first half of the novel moving into Katie's life, driving away all her other friends, playing on Katie, an aspiring model's, insecurity and body image issues in order to trigger severe anorexia, until Katie has an emotional breakdown and Miranda, who has blossomed from a drab nobody (literally - she seems to have no physical form) to a magnetic and charming beauty queen, finishes her off by betraying Katie and seducing her boyfriend multiple times.
That is not going under spoiler tags because a) it's about 30% of the novel and b) it's totally, blindingly obvious.
Now, I know what you guys are thinking, because I'm psychic and awesome like that.
Doesn't Katie sound like she should be the main character?
Well, I hear you. (Even if that's not what you were saying...shhh!). There are books in which having an otherwise secondary character as an observer should work well, like The Secret History. "Shift" is not at all like that, given that Olive and Katie rarely to never interact, and when they do, it's in cliches and trophes - "no-please-you-have-to-believe-me", "I-just-want-to-be-beautiful", "God, Olive, why don't you lose some weight and stop being so crazy?!" - so that it's impossible to care about what will happen to Katie. Not only that, but the writing in "Shift" is among some of the clumsiest I've ever read (yes, I'm aware that this review is clumsily-written, too). Bailey really needs a lesson in "show don't tell", because there are walls of text that simply seem to go like:
"Katie let Miranda borrow her headphones. Miranda started wearing the headphones all the time. Katie stopped hanging out with her other friends. It was just her and her boyfriend and Miranda. Miranda was starting to look blonder. She kind of looked like Katie. Katie started to look pale. Katie was losing weight and I was worried about her."
There's no deduction, no room for the reader to engage his/her brain, we're just led along by the hand and told how each thing happened. The foregone-conclusion aspect of this could have been creepy, but it wasn't because of the wooden and drab writing, and the fact that it's not just foregone, it's unbelievably obvious. Everything about Miranda is weird and evil from day one. There is also bizarre overuse of the word "lush", which seems to show up on every page.
It was as if Bailey had a checklist of things that she wanted to write in the novel and she was just putting them down on the page without really thinking about whether they would be interesting or enjoyable, because she really wanted to get to the end, damn it! At some points, it feels almost like reading an outline for a scene that Bailey wanted to write later.
Never fear if you think the novel should have been told from Katie's perspective, though. After half the novel has been
Bailey then rinses, shakes and repeats the whole plot.
Yes, seriously. Miranda moves on from Katie and onto Olive, deciding that she will use her magic magneticism to seduce a singer that Olive loves and take her to clothes stores to show off how much better-looking Miranda is than Olive, in the hopes that this will also drive Olive into a similar suicidal and sick state.
And, for some reason, it works.
The second half of this novel is one of the weirdest and trippiest things I've ever read. There's absolutely no psychological consistency. Olive has spent 50% of the book convinced that Miranda is some kind of succubus, sucking the life out of Katie and ultimately responsible for her death. Olive even sees her yawn at Katie's memorial service (this is presented as though it is a heinous thing so it's not just like Miranda got a bit uncontrollably tired, it's obviously done with malice).
Yet when Miranda bubbles up to Olive and starts talking about Olive's favourite band, Olive doesn't tell Miranda to piss off. She plays along eagerly, a totally random and inexplicable shfit in character that does not seem remotely intentional on Bailey's part. It's like Olive hit her head and forgot all about Miranda's supposed eeeeevil, because apparently Olive trusts Miranda enough to sneak out of her house to go see a band with her and buddies up with her to such an extent that they are sharing clothes and Olive feels sorry for her when Miranda burbles about her parents' death. There's no sense that Olive is being forced or manipulated to feel the way she does - she just does. But, since Miranda is blatantly evil from her first appearance to her last, it's impossible for the reader to feel anywhere near as swept up in Miranda's "charm" as we're supposed to believe Olive is.
Plus, for a murderous succubus, Miranda's methods seem to be kind of weak. Even worse, though, was that this book didn't even seem to be trying to deliver the creepy factor. As part of Miranda's quest to take over Katie's life, she takes away Katie's one treat - a choc-ice at the cinema - and gives her a bottle of water instead. Katie is apparently so psychologically dominated by Miranda that this one wordless action is enough to make her take the water and go away. Olive is so incensed that she goes into the cinema to give Katie the choc-ice - and finds Katie's boyfriend with his arm around Miranda! *gasp* And then Miranda smiles. We're in thriller cliche area here, and Bailey can't even deliver the thrills.
How is it possible for a novel to feel formulaic of itself? I don't know, and I know how confusing that sounds, but that's how I felt with "Shift." It's 300ish pages, but when Miranda started flirting with the band member that she thought Olive loved, I was like "oh, it's Katie all over again...standard "Shift" format..." which is crazy! It's insanely predictable, too, especially when it becomes clear (to everyone except Miranda) that Olive loves the band member's "hero type" half-brother, instead of the band-member himself.
Something that made me laugh because I'm a horrible person: the "incident" is She spends a disproportionate period of time trying to hide this from the reader, which made me scoff because it seemed immediately obvious to me what was going on. The logistics of what happened really are a something amazingly awful to behold, illogical and random, bordering on unintentional humour:
Also, the ending is horrendous, and it shows how utterly generic and unoriginal the entire novel was. It’s a depressing ending, but Bailey is so tone-deaf that she appears unable to see that.
The summing up word for this book has to be disappointment. So much potential and such a great premise, totally wasted.
July 20, 2012
1.5/5
Subtlety is not this book's strong suit... so, this wasn't that much of a psychological thriller. Obviously there’s a history here with everyone aware but having the same go unspoken. Yet, with the big ginormous hints littering the path toward the reveal, there really was no thrill for me in this one. At points, I even felt a little insulted by how it seemed someone had taken my hand and positioned my just so, as if saying, ‘see this? this is the way things went down; and that? that is why things are the way they are now.’ There’s zero figuring out going on in here.
There’s more than one mystery to figure out in an attempt to make matters more interesting; More than one unknown quantity entered the picture though Lachlan’s type lay on the side of the more predictable. What did we have in him? Why, yet another new hot boy crushing on the odd girl out! Question: Who’s been there and done that with me? Answer: Anyone whose picked up a YA paranormal in the recent past. The fact that he’s interested in her was not new; the fact is I saw little point in him save YA hotness quotient being fulfilled.
It’s Miranda and her oddness that should have upped the ante. Eventually, however, the same problem of things being handed to me happens with regard to her. My complaints ran along the lines of wanting to be allowed the chance to figure things out on my own. As in ‘stop leading me along like a baby and let me do it!'
Plus, it’s the mostly oddly arranged thing I’ve read in ages and that’s not really a good thing. Imagine your typical story of a building up, a climax, and a resolution thereafter; now imagine a big old knife slicing it clean in half and swapping those halves’ places , or more apt, skipping the tail end and then doubling up on the start. Why? SHIFT had the same thing taking place twice over! Imagine (again) my frustration over how people in it just. didn’t. see! I mean, why piece things together at all, when midway through it’s clear that it’s already been done for you? What an aggravating experience this was. Not even mentions of toxic friendships and blow by blow of how they could tear each other apart kept me interested. And even when things eventually did change up (a little) well, there was no steam left. The tension before resolution? Absent. Instead, there’s a big squelchy plop-y sound to mark the ending.
Subtlety is not this book's strong suit... so, this wasn't that much of a psychological thriller. Obviously there’s a history here with everyone aware but having the same go unspoken. Yet, with the big ginormous hints littering the path toward the reveal, there really was no thrill for me in this one. At points, I even felt a little insulted by how it seemed someone had taken my hand and positioned my just so, as if saying, ‘see this? this is the way things went down; and that? that is why things are the way they are now.’ There’s zero figuring out going on in here.
There’s more than one mystery to figure out in an attempt to make matters more interesting; More than one unknown quantity entered the picture though Lachlan’s type lay on the side of the more predictable. What did we have in him? Why, yet another new hot boy crushing on the odd girl out! Question: Who’s been there and done that with me? Answer: Anyone whose picked up a YA paranormal in the recent past. The fact that he’s interested in her was not new; the fact is I saw little point in him save YA hotness quotient being fulfilled.
It’s Miranda and her oddness that should have upped the ante. Eventually, however, the same problem of things being handed to me happens with regard to her. My complaints ran along the lines of wanting to be allowed the chance to figure things out on my own. As in ‘stop leading me along like a baby and let me do it!'
Plus, it’s the mostly oddly arranged thing I’ve read in ages and that’s not really a good thing. Imagine your typical story of a building up, a climax, and a resolution thereafter; now imagine a big old knife slicing it clean in half and swapping those halves’ places , or more apt, skipping the tail end and then doubling up on the start. Why? SHIFT had the same thing taking place twice over! Imagine (again) my frustration over how people in it just. didn’t. see! I mean, why piece things together at all, when midway through it’s clear that it’s already been done for you? What an aggravating experience this was. Not even mentions of toxic friendships and blow by blow of how they could tear each other apart kept me interested. And even when things eventually did change up (a little) well, there was no steam left. The tension before resolution? Absent. Instead, there’s a big squelchy plop-y sound to mark the ending.
December 1, 2011
Oh... My... God. There are almost no words to describe my state of mind after reading 'Shift'. Em Bailey should be applauded, and I am definitely grateful for her impeccable writing skills that never once failed to leave me questioning my own sanity.
This genre wasn't one I'd usually take to, but this book just begging me to read it, and so I did. I was pleasantly surprised.
All the characters were written so well- Miranda always left me wondering. Was she just a psychotic girl, suffering from her desperation to fit in; or was she something else entirely?
Olive, who we slowly discover, was wonderful to read. I just love the fact that Bailey could write her so realistically; blurring the lines between reality and fantasy, ending the book with the mysterious disappearance of Miranda that left the story hanging giving the reader something to wonder about.
After a day's worth of reading, I can honestly say I am half in awe of Bailey and half frightened by how much this book has made me think. Honestly, I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a story filled with twists that will surely keep them awake until the early hours of the morning.
This genre wasn't one I'd usually take to, but this book just begging me to read it, and so I did. I was pleasantly surprised.
All the characters were written so well- Miranda always left me wondering. Was she just a psychotic girl, suffering from her desperation to fit in; or was she something else entirely?
Olive, who we slowly discover, was wonderful to read. I just love the fact that Bailey could write her so realistically; blurring the lines between reality and fantasy, ending the book with the mysterious disappearance of Miranda that left the story hanging giving the reader something to wonder about.
After a day's worth of reading, I can honestly say I am half in awe of Bailey and half frightened by how much this book has made me think. Honestly, I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a story filled with twists that will surely keep them awake until the early hours of the morning.
November 24, 2012
This was one CREEPY book! Half way through the book I was in this state:
Despite it's obvious creepiness I couldn't put it down.
So Olive was this typical once-popular-now-loner kid with issues, but what those issues were was not so clear in the beginning. At times I was totally frustrated with her and I was screaming at the book what are you doing??? and yes I was totally scared of the people in the book!
I just had chills all over! and by the time I finished I was doubting my own reality
I'll be keeping an eye out for more books from this author!
Despite it's obvious creepiness I couldn't put it down.
So Olive was this typical once-popular-now-loner kid with issues, but what those issues were was not so clear in the beginning. At times I was totally frustrated with her and I was screaming at the book what are you doing??? and yes I was totally scared of the people in the book!
I just had chills all over! and by the time I finished I was doubting my own reality
I'll be keeping an eye out for more books from this author!
March 30, 2015
Miranda Vaile is the strong point of this young adult novel. It is well worth reading for her alone. Miranda is offered to us, on the one hand, as a supernatural demon and on the other as a rolled-gold bitch who is disturbed and rageful, but also charming to the nth degree. For good measure, she can also be seen as the symbol of a destructive inner voice, enticing one unlucky girl into anorexia. Whatever she is exactly, Miranda has the psychopaths’s ability to pinpoint and play to our longings, fears and frailties, without a particle of real empathy.
The narrator is fellow high school student Olive Corbett, who has plenty of her own issues to work through. Family stuff. Huge amounts of confusion, guilt and anger have knocked her off course. In the early part of the novel she is trying to sort herself out while also observing Miranda from a distance.
Olive has ample evidence that Miranda is vicious and destructive, and decides, reasonably enough, to avoid her. That’s all thrown out the window, though, when Miranda turns her attentions to Olive. Miranda is fun, cutting through social barriers to get her and her underage friends-of-the-moment into nightclubs and posh fashion shoots. The devil indeed wears Prada. Miranda inspires obsessive adoration, which is also seductive, even while separating you from the humble everyday world.
It’s a life lesson: a scary person who suddenly turns sweet, and even flatters you, is almost irresistably seductive, a dream come true. Reason and rationality won't defeat them.
The rival that a demon cannot defeat, though, is the genuine lover – someone who knows you well enough to offer respect, tenderness and passion.
Who or what is Miranda really? In a way, it doesn't matter. Herman Melville didn’t need the fantasy genre to show us Moby Dick as the ‘gliding great demon of the deep’. He just had to float the idea.
The double is used as a literary device throughout, to explore personal identity.
Males generally appear in a positive light – the young ones anyway – but in the romance tradition they are pretty much wooden props, even when they say and do the right thing.
The narrator is fellow high school student Olive Corbett, who has plenty of her own issues to work through. Family stuff. Huge amounts of confusion, guilt and anger have knocked her off course. In the early part of the novel she is trying to sort herself out while also observing Miranda from a distance.
Olive has ample evidence that Miranda is vicious and destructive, and decides, reasonably enough, to avoid her. That’s all thrown out the window, though, when Miranda turns her attentions to Olive. Miranda is fun, cutting through social barriers to get her and her underage friends-of-the-moment into nightclubs and posh fashion shoots. The devil indeed wears Prada. Miranda inspires obsessive adoration, which is also seductive, even while separating you from the humble everyday world.
It’s a life lesson: a scary person who suddenly turns sweet, and even flatters you, is almost irresistably seductive, a dream come true. Reason and rationality won't defeat them.
The rival that a demon cannot defeat, though, is the genuine lover – someone who knows you well enough to offer respect, tenderness and passion.
Who or what is Miranda really? In a way, it doesn't matter. Herman Melville didn’t need the fantasy genre to show us Moby Dick as the ‘gliding great demon of the deep’. He just had to float the idea.
The double is used as a literary device throughout, to explore personal identity.
Males generally appear in a positive light – the young ones anyway – but in the romance tradition they are pretty much wooden props, even when they say and do the right thing.
March 17, 2020
This book was surprisingly quick to read. I was expecting to read it over a few days but I finished it in a day. It was confusing but good and surprising and predictable. It was the kind of book where you find yourself internally shouting at the main character when they do something stupid and there is an obvious reason why but it was still good.
August 18, 2013
4.5 Stars
I absolutely loved this! I just grabbed this at the library because it was available, and I was sick of waiting on titles, and now I'm so glad I did! I went into it not really knowing what to expect because none of the people I follow have read this (and I hope that changes after this review because it's a great book!), and usually I prefer to go into things knowing a bit more about what to expect, but it was fun to be taken by surprise for once.
The story is about Olive who has some quirks and some kind of issue that happened in her not so distant past. She was the beta to the alpha female and then she found herself on the outside after her Incident leaving her one friend; Ami. Ami is the perfect friend for Olive because she doesn't judge her on how much she's changed, or how weird any of her thoughts might be, but one day a new girl comes to their school and everything is thrown into chaos for Olive and Ami.
Miranda Vaile was rumored to have killed her parents, and when she arrives at the school the alpha female initially shuns her. Slowly but surely Miranda works her way into not only being part of the clique, but becoming the new alpha herself. There's something about her though that Olive and Ami just don't like, and even though it is completely illogical, they can't help but wonder if she is some kind of shape shifter and liken her to a parasite. It does seem as though Miranda is almost stealing the life force of her new best friend though now doesn't it?! It isn't until Ami encourages Olive to confront Miranda that things take a turn for the worse.
I found this book to be creepy enough to thoroughly entertain me but it doesn't strike me as a psychological thriller the way the synopsis claims it to be. It was glaringly obvious about what was happening to Olive and I did get a little annoyed with her for not picking up on things sooner, but she is a damaged girl and was trying to do what she had been advised to do (by her therapist) so I can understand some of her blindness. I loved Lachlan a great deal, and Ami, Toby, and even Olive's vegetarian-hippie mom with her terrible foods. I wish I had some inkling of what happened with the teacher though, that is something I was waiting to know and never got, but it's a minor complaint.
I would recommend this book to people who like a slightly creepy story, or who love twisted/dark/hurting characters. Olive is hurting a lot through this and my heart broke for her a couple of times (). All in all I thought that this was paced fairly well, written in a believable voice, and completely entertaining.
I absolutely loved this! I just grabbed this at the library because it was available, and I was sick of waiting on titles, and now I'm so glad I did! I went into it not really knowing what to expect because none of the people I follow have read this (and I hope that changes after this review because it's a great book!), and usually I prefer to go into things knowing a bit more about what to expect, but it was fun to be taken by surprise for once.
The story is about Olive who has some quirks and some kind of issue that happened in her not so distant past. She was the beta to the alpha female and then she found herself on the outside after her Incident leaving her one friend; Ami. Ami is the perfect friend for Olive because she doesn't judge her on how much she's changed, or how weird any of her thoughts might be, but one day a new girl comes to their school and everything is thrown into chaos for Olive and Ami.
Miranda Vaile was rumored to have killed her parents, and when she arrives at the school the alpha female initially shuns her. Slowly but surely Miranda works her way into not only being part of the clique, but becoming the new alpha herself. There's something about her though that Olive and Ami just don't like, and even though it is completely illogical, they can't help but wonder if she is some kind of shape shifter and liken her to a parasite. It does seem as though Miranda is almost stealing the life force of her new best friend though now doesn't it?! It isn't until Ami encourages Olive to confront Miranda that things take a turn for the worse.
I found this book to be creepy enough to thoroughly entertain me but it doesn't strike me as a psychological thriller the way the synopsis claims it to be. It was glaringly obvious about what was happening to Olive and I did get a little annoyed with her for not picking up on things sooner, but she is a damaged girl and was trying to do what she had been advised to do (by her therapist) so I can understand some of her blindness. I loved Lachlan a great deal, and Ami, Toby, and even Olive's vegetarian-hippie mom with her terrible foods. I wish I had some inkling of what happened with the teacher though, that is something I was waiting to know and never got, but it's a minor complaint.
I would recommend this book to people who like a slightly creepy story, or who love twisted/dark/hurting characters. Olive is hurting a lot through this and my heart broke for her a couple of times (). All in all I thought that this was paced fairly well, written in a believable voice, and completely entertaining.
November 19, 2011
Okay, so I decided I'd give this book to someone else before I reviewed it. Just because, well, I wasn't sure whether I wasn't getting it because I am stupid, or whether I wasn't getting it because I wasn't SUPPOSED to get it. Turns out, either we're both stupid, or it's just one of those books.
You know the ones I'm talking about... the ones with the fantastic writing, brilliant prose, life-like characters... those books that leave you SO... UTTERLY... CONFUSED!
So basically, the story settles itself quite tightly around the life of one Olive (as in the name)…a troubled individual... as she examines the destructive, unnatural and downright creepiness of her new classmate, Miranda. Together, Olive and her best friend Amy, investigate Miranda as deeply as they can and promptly decide that she’s dangerous.
A few chapters in, you feel that you've started to get the hang of the story... curious bestie, hot new-guy, creepy new-girl, popular bitches. Olive seems so... normal; she has a regular job at a cinema, a crazy-loyal best friend and a simple, common family situation with a mother and one little brother. You start to see that this is just a regular (if slightly more realistic than most)YA fantasy novel. The suspense is building and your guessing that, a little later on, the horror and action will start, then somehow, against all odds, Olive will trump her opponent and walk away with a nice little happily ever after.
.
.
.
AND THEN!
SOMETHING (not telling what... not going to ruin the surprise... nope... NEVER!) turns your entire understanding of the story on its head. It takes what you thought you knew about Olive's life, what you predicted for it, and then rips it to shreds. Now you have NO IDEA where you're going, what's right and what's wrong, what's true and what's false. Now you just have to ride out the rest of the story like a wave, feeling totally out of control having ABSOLUTELY NO understanding of what's going on.
But, and here comes the genius of Em Bailey, despite what you decide is (well at least how you're going to take it as) the truth, the outcome, the message and the entirety of the novel itself is the same. It's either a fantasy or a dark realist... but either way it's chilling and brilliant.
You know the ones I'm talking about... the ones with the fantastic writing, brilliant prose, life-like characters... those books that leave you SO... UTTERLY... CONFUSED!
So basically, the story settles itself quite tightly around the life of one Olive (as in the name)…a troubled individual... as she examines the destructive, unnatural and downright creepiness of her new classmate, Miranda. Together, Olive and her best friend Amy, investigate Miranda as deeply as they can and promptly decide that she’s dangerous.
A few chapters in, you feel that you've started to get the hang of the story... curious bestie, hot new-guy, creepy new-girl, popular bitches. Olive seems so... normal; she has a regular job at a cinema, a crazy-loyal best friend and a simple, common family situation with a mother and one little brother. You start to see that this is just a regular (if slightly more realistic than most)YA fantasy novel. The suspense is building and your guessing that, a little later on, the horror and action will start, then somehow, against all odds, Olive will trump her opponent and walk away with a nice little happily ever after.
.
.
.
AND THEN!
SOMETHING (not telling what... not going to ruin the surprise... nope... NEVER!) turns your entire understanding of the story on its head. It takes what you thought you knew about Olive's life, what you predicted for it, and then rips it to shreds. Now you have NO IDEA where you're going, what's right and what's wrong, what's true and what's false. Now you just have to ride out the rest of the story like a wave, feeling totally out of control having ABSOLUTELY NO understanding of what's going on.
But, and here comes the genius of Em Bailey, despite what you decide is (well at least how you're going to take it as) the truth, the outcome, the message and the entirety of the novel itself is the same. It's either a fantasy or a dark realist... but either way it's chilling and brilliant.
May 4, 2018
Flicking through books on offer, I stumbled upon two Em Bailey novels. Intrigued by both, I decided to give one of the books a read. Without looking at the books on Goodreads, without any idea of the reviews and ratings, I decided Shift sounded like the more interesting option – and if I enjoyed it, I decided I would be back for the other Em Bailey novel.
Despite how interesting Shift sounded, I found myself rather disappointed by this one. It is a book where I was stuck between a two-star rating and a three-star rating, where the former won out as it really wasn’t quite enough for me to round my two-point-five-star rating up.
In truth, I really should have known better. No matter how interesting young adult thrillers sound, I’m always let down. I threw myself into adult thrillers before reading young adult thrillers, and due to this my standards have always been set higher. For me, young adult thrillers are always too predictable for my liking and fail to have the high impact of their adult counterparts. I’m sure there are plenty of good young adult thrillers on the market, I simply have trouble enjoying them as much as I would like.
Even by my mental standard of young adult thrillers, Shift was a bit too predictable. It was filled with far too many clichés – in terms of situations, characters, and events – which made it difficult for me to get down deep into this story. It was a quick and easy read, meaning I was able to finish it in next to no time at all, but at no point did the story shock me or really get my heart pumping.
The story had potential, but it didn’t quite do it for me. I may give the other Em Bailey novel a read, but I doubt I will be going back to the bookstore and buying it anytime soon.
Despite how interesting Shift sounded, I found myself rather disappointed by this one. It is a book where I was stuck between a two-star rating and a three-star rating, where the former won out as it really wasn’t quite enough for me to round my two-point-five-star rating up.
In truth, I really should have known better. No matter how interesting young adult thrillers sound, I’m always let down. I threw myself into adult thrillers before reading young adult thrillers, and due to this my standards have always been set higher. For me, young adult thrillers are always too predictable for my liking and fail to have the high impact of their adult counterparts. I’m sure there are plenty of good young adult thrillers on the market, I simply have trouble enjoying them as much as I would like.
Even by my mental standard of young adult thrillers, Shift was a bit too predictable. It was filled with far too many clichés – in terms of situations, characters, and events – which made it difficult for me to get down deep into this story. It was a quick and easy read, meaning I was able to finish it in next to no time at all, but at no point did the story shock me or really get my heart pumping.
The story had potential, but it didn’t quite do it for me. I may give the other Em Bailey novel a read, but I doubt I will be going back to the bookstore and buying it anytime soon.
September 17, 2012
There are spoilers. This is an intelligent discussion of the text. Deal with it.
Wow.
This book was intense and very taught, although it became a little too neat towards the center when Olive stops suspecting Miranda of being "evil" and just becomes buddy-buddy. But then again, with Olive suspecting that Miranda is something insidious, isn't that how this story should go? Letting your guard down and letting the insidious in because you no longer suspect it?
The story is that of Olive Corbett, a girl released some six months before the initial beginning of the story from the mental ward of the local clinic. It is of her quest to prove she is sane and can function in the real world while dealing with high school. All of a sudden Miranda Vaile, the new girl, comes in to town and starts to involve herself in the life of the queen bee and Olive's former best friend Katie Clark. When Katie begins to wither away and become a nonentity, while Miranda becomes stronger and more beautiful, Olive is left to discern what is reality and what is illusion.
The reader is never really sure if Miranda is a shapeshifter, as Olive suspects. We assume it to be true, but the entire book is based upon perception. Perhaps it really is all in Olive's mind, as the story suggests throughout the unfolding of the tale.
Essentially this book is a "Is it supernatural or not?" story, where the main character doubts herself, all for the sake of appearing normal and sane.
It is excellently written in my opinion, and maybe the end falls a little flat by just ending.
But then again, perhaps it should without us ever finding out where Miranda ran off to or definitively proving that she is something supernatural. As Olive tries to move on, she pushes Miranda out, so the ending does suit.
In this day and age where we readers are given every tantalizing detail ad infinitum to the point where everything is explained and we have all the facts, here is Em Bailey's novel, where everything is very hazy, especially Olive's tenuous perspective of reality and whether or not dear Miranda is really a big bad after all.
I think honestly we are meant to be left wondering if Miranda was truly a shapeshifter or not, or if she indeed is truly "more fucked up" than Olive. We are given clues and led to believe that Miranda is a parasitic shapeshifter that moves from one host to the next. However, we are cast in to doubt since we see everything from Olive's viewpoint and she concertedly making the effort to not think supposedly "paranoid delusional thoughts".
Honestly, the theme of unreality is perfect for this psychological thriller. In the end it doesn't matter if Miranda was or wasn't supernatural, or our craving for truth is satisfied. Olive survives. And that's all that matters.
Cheers Em Bailey. Cheers.
Wow.
This book was intense and very taught, although it became a little too neat towards the center when Olive stops suspecting Miranda of being "evil" and just becomes buddy-buddy. But then again, with Olive suspecting that Miranda is something insidious, isn't that how this story should go? Letting your guard down and letting the insidious in because you no longer suspect it?
The story is that of Olive Corbett, a girl released some six months before the initial beginning of the story from the mental ward of the local clinic. It is of her quest to prove she is sane and can function in the real world while dealing with high school. All of a sudden Miranda Vaile, the new girl, comes in to town and starts to involve herself in the life of the queen bee and Olive's former best friend Katie Clark. When Katie begins to wither away and become a nonentity, while Miranda becomes stronger and more beautiful, Olive is left to discern what is reality and what is illusion.
The reader is never really sure if Miranda is a shapeshifter, as Olive suspects. We assume it to be true, but the entire book is based upon perception. Perhaps it really is all in Olive's mind, as the story suggests throughout the unfolding of the tale.
Essentially this book is a "Is it supernatural or not?" story, where the main character doubts herself, all for the sake of appearing normal and sane.
It is excellently written in my opinion, and maybe the end falls a little flat by just ending.
But then again, perhaps it should without us ever finding out where Miranda ran off to or definitively proving that she is something supernatural. As Olive tries to move on, she pushes Miranda out, so the ending does suit.
In this day and age where we readers are given every tantalizing detail ad infinitum to the point where everything is explained and we have all the facts, here is Em Bailey's novel, where everything is very hazy, especially Olive's tenuous perspective of reality and whether or not dear Miranda is really a big bad after all.
I think honestly we are meant to be left wondering if Miranda was truly a shapeshifter or not, or if she indeed is truly "more fucked up" than Olive. We are given clues and led to believe that Miranda is a parasitic shapeshifter that moves from one host to the next. However, we are cast in to doubt since we see everything from Olive's viewpoint and she concertedly making the effort to not think supposedly "paranoid delusional thoughts".
Honestly, the theme of unreality is perfect for this psychological thriller. In the end it doesn't matter if Miranda was or wasn't supernatural, or our craving for truth is satisfied. Olive survives. And that's all that matters.
Cheers Em Bailey. Cheers.
February 28, 2013
From reading everyone else's reviews about this book it seems people either love it or hate it. Me? Yeah, I didn't like it very much. I picked it up just randomly from the book store because it was half price (i'm actually glad I didn't pay full price for it really) and also because it sounded like it would be really good, and the cover is pretty awesome too. But it was officially just the weirdest book I'd ever read, it was so strange.
Also I was pretty disappointed to find out that the back of the book told me almost the whole plot , and what it didn't tell you was extremely predictable. That made me sad because it could have had so much potential as a story, and I just... it irritated me.
Then you have the main character, Olive. Just don't even get me started on her. I think someone should give her a trophy for the most annoying character ever. I don't know, she like seemed to have some sort of memory lapse like halfway through and didn't take any of her own advice from the first half of the book. And she was so whiny too. Nothing irritates me more than a whiny main character. And then you have that guy Lachlan, or whatever his name was. I'm not even really sure what the point of his character was. I couldn't really see what purpose he served. But I just couldn't connect with any of the characters, which for me is one of the most important things I have to be able to do with a book.
The ending was pretty boring and predictable too. I forced myself to carry on reading it, even though I got bored with it because I hate leaving a book half unfinished, but also because I think part of me was hoping that it would pick up and have a good ending. Sadly, that didn't happen and I was just left feeling really disappointed with the book.
Also I was pretty disappointed to find out that the back of the book told me almost the whole plot , and what it didn't tell you was extremely predictable. That made me sad because it could have had so much potential as a story, and I just... it irritated me.
Then you have the main character, Olive. Just don't even get me started on her. I think someone should give her a trophy for the most annoying character ever. I don't know, she like seemed to have some sort of memory lapse like halfway through and didn't take any of her own advice from the first half of the book. And she was so whiny too. Nothing irritates me more than a whiny main character. And then you have that guy Lachlan, or whatever his name was. I'm not even really sure what the point of his character was. I couldn't really see what purpose he served. But I just couldn't connect with any of the characters, which for me is one of the most important things I have to be able to do with a book.
The ending was pretty boring and predictable too. I forced myself to carry on reading it, even though I got bored with it because I hate leaving a book half unfinished, but also because I think part of me was hoping that it would pick up and have a good ending. Sadly, that didn't happen and I was just left feeling really disappointed with the book.
July 21, 2013
5 stars out of five. For a reason:
Shift by Em Bailey is one of my all-time favourite books. It's full of gripping twists that will never leave you bored.
The first half of the book will make you love Olive. The second half will have you mentally screaming at every decision she makes! (But I won't give away anything)
Lachlan is such a sweetie and so is Luxe (the romance sides to the book) yet this book is far from your usual romance story. Yep. There's even death.
Murder.
Psychologically mental people.
Wow and suspense.
I actually could feel shivers running down my spine at so many points.
There's many huge twists in this book and one of them just blew my mind so much that I had to set the book down, breathe and recount what the heck just happened.
I seriously can't stress how amazing this book is. There are so many twists and it's almost impossible to mention anything without giving something away. All I can say is: 'Read this, you will laugh, cry, scream and hyperventilate. It is an amazing read that you will never forget.'
The writing: It is written in Olive's point of view. She is a great protagonist who has feelings just like most of us so she is far from annoying, agitating, frustrating or unrelatable.
The characters are so strong that you will be gripped. The whole book has been written so cleverly that you know what's happening but you don't at the same time.
Negatives: I really can't find anything. This book is flawless and a must-read for every book worm who is looking for something about a concept never really written about before. It takes a thrilling twist on fiction fantasy in a grippingly real way.
Overall: fabulous book. I can't wait until I can't remember enough of it so I can read it again in a few years to experience the whole feel of it again. One of my favourites and it will be forever.
Tamsin.
PS: I hope Em Bailey writes more! She is an author to be watched.
Shift by Em Bailey is one of my all-time favourite books. It's full of gripping twists that will never leave you bored.
The first half of the book will make you love Olive. The second half will have you mentally screaming at every decision she makes! (But I won't give away anything)
Lachlan is such a sweetie and so is Luxe (the romance sides to the book) yet this book is far from your usual romance story. Yep. There's even death.
Murder.
Psychologically mental people.
Wow and suspense.
I actually could feel shivers running down my spine at so many points.
There's many huge twists in this book and one of them just blew my mind so much that I had to set the book down, breathe and recount what the heck just happened.
I seriously can't stress how amazing this book is. There are so many twists and it's almost impossible to mention anything without giving something away. All I can say is: 'Read this, you will laugh, cry, scream and hyperventilate. It is an amazing read that you will never forget.'
The writing: It is written in Olive's point of view. She is a great protagonist who has feelings just like most of us so she is far from annoying, agitating, frustrating or unrelatable.
The characters are so strong that you will be gripped. The whole book has been written so cleverly that you know what's happening but you don't at the same time.
Negatives: I really can't find anything. This book is flawless and a must-read for every book worm who is looking for something about a concept never really written about before. It takes a thrilling twist on fiction fantasy in a grippingly real way.
Overall: fabulous book. I can't wait until I can't remember enough of it so I can read it again in a few years to experience the whole feel of it again. One of my favourites and it will be forever.
Tamsin.
PS: I hope Em Bailey writes more! She is an author to be watched.
April 2, 2016
2.5 out of 5 stars.
Shift was a really easy and enjoyable read, I loved the idea of the book and a few of the characters were great (Ami, Lachlan and Toby especially). However, the main character Olive was an IDIOT! At first I liked her, but she makes the wrong decision in regards to Miranda and Lachlan EVERY. SINGLE. TIME!!!!!
I found the whole toxic friendship thing quite realistic and relatable (in regards to Katie, not necessarily Miranda). One big drawback for me was I guessed the big twist (about Ami) on about page 30. Ami was my favourite character too, so that twist was annoying!!
Overall Shift was a nice, quick read and I recommend it. I did enjoy it, though I don't think I'll be in a rush to reread it.
Shift was a really easy and enjoyable read, I loved the idea of the book and a few of the characters were great (Ami, Lachlan and Toby especially). However, the main character Olive was an IDIOT! At first I liked her, but she makes the wrong decision in regards to Miranda and Lachlan EVERY. SINGLE. TIME!!!!!
I found the whole toxic friendship thing quite realistic and relatable (in regards to Katie, not necessarily Miranda). One big drawback for me was I guessed the big twist (about Ami) on about page 30. Ami was my favourite character too, so that twist was annoying!!
Overall Shift was a nice, quick read and I recommend it. I did enjoy it, though I don't think I'll be in a rush to reread it.
May 17, 2019
This was quite great! However, I was really ticked off that Olive suddenly changed her entire attitude towards Miranda after her apologizing once? It was still quite gripping for me though...
Actual rating: 3.5 stars.
Actual rating: 3.5 stars.
May 3, 2020
This book surprised me! I wasn’t expecting much but I ended up really enjoying it and was actually surprised at some of the twists! Although it wasn’t perfect and I found myself feeling frustrated about certain parts of the story I overall liked the book and thought it was a good YA thriller.
April 1, 2015
Es ist wirklich eine Seltenheit, auf einen Thriller zu treffen, der einem Gänsehaut verschafft, eine wahnsinnig intensive Atmosphäre aufbaut und in dem man keine Ahnung hat, was genau nun Realität und was Fantasie ist. Denn genau das tut Du denkst, du weißt, wer ich bin mit dem Leser: Es gibt derartig viele Wendungen, die einen erschrocken die Augen aufreißen lassen, es wird sehr viel mit der Psyche des Menschen gespielt und letztlich ist dies ein Buch, das man zuschlägt und keine Ahnung hat, was eigentlich gerade passiert ist. Letzteres kann diesem Buch auch zum Verhängnis werden, was allerdings noch später angesprochen wird,
Womit die australische Autorin definitiv punkten kann, ist ihr Schreibstil. Ihre Art und Weise, die Stimmung zu vermitteln, Charaktere zum Leben erwachen zu lassen und ihre Beziehungen untereinander darzustellen, ist einfach bewundernswert. Außerdem ist es interessant, wie wenig Zeit eine Rolle zu spielen scheint, denn man ist als Leser auch vielen Sprüngen ausgesetzt, die jedoch überhaupt nicht stören, weil diese Geschichte dies einfach nicht braucht. Zudem unterstreicht diese Zeitlosigkeit auch die Atmosphäre des Buches, die zum einen wirklich unangenehm und nahezu schon ,,kafkaesk'' ist, zum anderen ist es genau das, was einen dazu bringt, das Buch die Nacht über bis 3 Uhr morgens (ja, ich habe endlich Ferien) zu lesen. Hierbei ist das Buch auch sehr schnell und flüssig durch den Stil, der zwischen Teenie und Adult balanciert.
Auch die Wahl von Olive als Erzählerin der Geschichte ist eine sehr gute gewesen, auch wenn es bei obiger Inhaltsangabe so erscheint, als wäre Katie eine bessere Wahl gewesen. Jedoch ist Olive aufgrund all dem, was sie erlebt hat und was sie ausmacht, eine sehr viel interessantere Protagonistin. Sie muss Tabletten nehmen, hat eine gewisse Zeit in der Klinik verbracht, und isoliert sich sehr stark von ihren Schulkameraden, ebenso wie von ihrer Familie. Aus diesem Grund ist es sehr spannend, Stück für Stück herauszufinden, was sich in ihrer Vergangenheit zugetragen hat, um sie zu dem Menschen werden zu lassen, der sie ist, und wegen dieser Ausgefallenheit ist sie einem auch sehr sympathisch. Natürlich besitzt sie ihre Makel, jedoch stören diese kaum und unterstreichen nur noch, wie fragil sie eigentlich ist, jedoch entschlossen ist zu kämpfen. Anfangs habe ich persönlich mich etwas darüber gewundert, dass sie so augenblicklich ein Interesse an Miranda entwickelt, da sie etwas obsessiv rübergekommen ist, jedoch habe ich sie im Laufe des Buches wirklich zu mögen gelernt und bin mir sicher, dass viele andere dies auch tun werden, vor allem aufgrund ihrer Entwicklung.
Auch alle anderen Charaktere sind sehr interessant gestaltet und wirken zunächst vielleicht so, als stellten sie Stereotypen dar, jedoch wird man sich äußerst schnell bewusst, dass man da vorschnell geurteilt hat. Vor allem Olive's Familie und ihre beste Freundin Ami sind sehr sympathisch und schaffen es, einen immer wieder zu überraschen. Auch Lachlan, der anfangs gewirkt hat wie der typische beliebte Sportlertyp, hat sich als ein sehr netter und überhaupt nicht eingebildeter Typ erwiesen, ebenso wie Katie, Olive's ehemalige beste Freundin und Queen Bee der High School.
Der dennoch faszinierendste Charakter für mich ist jedoch Miranda. Man könnte sie auch gut mit dem Bermudadreieck vergleichen: Sie strahlt etwas Gefährliches und gleichzeitig Reizendes aus, scheint hierbei jedoch eine Figur zu sein, von der man sich nicht sicher sein kann, ob sie tatsächlich existiert oder nicht. Das Mädchen verhält sich so, als seien ihr keine Grenzen gesetzt, kommt mit allem durch, dass sie sich in den Kopf setzt, und wirkt so, als hätte sie in irgendeiner Weise magische Fähigkeiten, mit deren Hilfe sie alles wahr werden lässt, was sie sich wünscht. Insofern kann man verstehen, warum sie Olive fasziniert, jedoch hat sie mir auch einen kalten Schauer den Rücken runterlaufen lassen, weil sie einfach derartig irreal erscheint, dass man sich nicht sicher ist, ob man sich hier nun in einem Fantasy- oder Contemporaryroman befindet. Wie sonst, wenn nicht mit übermenschlichen Kräften, könnte man sich so derartig viele Details merken, gewisse Dinge herbekommen und es ermöglichen, ein Leben ohne irgendwelche Regelungen zu führen? Ist Miranda einfach nur ein sehr rebellischer und psychotischer Teenager, der verzweifelt nach Selbstbestätigung sucht, indem er anderen das Leben klaut und sie dazu bringt, sie zu beneiden? Oder verbirgt sich vielleicht eine mythologische Kreatur hinter diesem Mädchen, das so schnell und so perfekt Menschen imitieren kann und das ungewöhnlich viele Menschen in einer Stadt kennt, in der es vorher niemals gewesen ist?
Dass bis zum Ende nicht klar ist, wer Miranda eigentlich ist, macht dieses Buch auch so derartig spannend. Stück für Stück erfährt man Details, die einen zwischen der einen und der anderen Theorie hin und her schwanken lassen, und man kann gar nicht anders als weiterzulesen, weil es derart verstrickt ist, dass man wirklich keinen blassen Schimmer hat, was in diesem Buch eigentlich passiert. Ebenso spannend ist zu verfolgen, wie Mirandas Opfer sich einlullen lassen und wie diese darangeht, ihnen scheinbar jede Lebenslust und -kraft auszusaugen. Außer dem Fall Miranda verfolgt man außerdem noch Olive's Leben mit, das zwar nicht aus Dingen besteht, die die Herzen aller typischen Mädchen höherschlagen lassen, jedoch bekommt man auch hier Stück für Stück ihre Geschichte mit und findet diese vor allem wegen den psychologischen Aspekten interessant. Denn durch Vieles, was Olive erlebt und erzählt, stellt man sich selbst die Frage, ob Personen, Dinge oder Konflikte in diesem Buch tatsächlich existieren. Dies kommt zum einen durch die vorher beschriebene Atmosphäre, zum anderen wegen gewissen Wendepunkten zustande, die einen daran zweifeln lassen, ob Olive das Gespür für die Realität überhaupt noch besitzt.
Ein spannungsreicher, stimmiger und psychologischer Thriller also. Perfekter könnte es doch eigentlich nicht sein, richtig?
Leider doch. Denn so gut ich es finde, dass man keine Ahnung hat, welchem Genre dieses Buch denn nun angehört und ob dieses ganze Geschehen überhaupt existiert und was mit Miranda nicht in Ordnung ist, so sehr hasse ich die Tatsache, dass nicht eine einzige dieser Fragen beantwortet wird. Aus diesem Grund betonte ich auch, dass der Titel für dieses Buch so wunderbar passt: Man hat keine Ahnung, welchem Genre das Buch angehört, was in diesem Buch real ist und was nicht und was nun genau Miranda ist: Mensch oder übernatürlich? Es ist so, als hätte Em Bailey ein Wetter wie vor dem Ausbruchs eines Sturms erschaffen: Es ist schwül, man bekommt Kopfschmerzen, die Atmosphäre ist drückend und geladen und man sehnt die Erlösung des Regens herbei ... dieser kommt allerdings nicht. Insofern kann das Buch einen sehr unbefriedigt zurücklassen, weil damit nicht klar ist, ob das Buch denn somit all das aufgebauschte Potential tatsächlich ausgeschöpft hat. Mich zumindest hat dieser Faktor wahnsinnig gestört und dieses sonst so wahnsinnig gute Buch in den Dreck gezogen.
Letzten Endes besitzt dieser Thriller eigentlich alles, was ein guter Thriller braucht: originelle und sympathische Charaktere, eine gewisse emotionale Tiefe, die durch all die Tragik und die Verluste entstehen, außerdem noch das Gefühl, dass nichts so ist, wie es scheint, und einen Plot, der einem bis zum Ende des Buches ein großes Geheimnis bleibt. Doch wie genau soll man ein Buch bewerten, das man wegen dem fehlendem Abschluss bzw. der fehlenden Auflösung nicht einordnen kann? Auch wenn ich vor dem Lesen dieses Buches dachte, man könnte eine Geschichte nie zu verschachtelt gestalten - Em Bailey hat es geschafft, diese von mir aufgestellte These umzuwerfen. Ein sehr gutes Buch, dem allerdings der letztliche Schlussstrich oder irgendein finaler Hinweis definitiv nicht geschadet hätte. Insgesamt also zum Haareraufen.
Gesamtpunktzahl: 4.00/5.00
Mehr Rezensionen von mir unter sanas-version.blogspot.de
Womit die australische Autorin definitiv punkten kann, ist ihr Schreibstil. Ihre Art und Weise, die Stimmung zu vermitteln, Charaktere zum Leben erwachen zu lassen und ihre Beziehungen untereinander darzustellen, ist einfach bewundernswert. Außerdem ist es interessant, wie wenig Zeit eine Rolle zu spielen scheint, denn man ist als Leser auch vielen Sprüngen ausgesetzt, die jedoch überhaupt nicht stören, weil diese Geschichte dies einfach nicht braucht. Zudem unterstreicht diese Zeitlosigkeit auch die Atmosphäre des Buches, die zum einen wirklich unangenehm und nahezu schon ,,kafkaesk'' ist, zum anderen ist es genau das, was einen dazu bringt, das Buch die Nacht über bis 3 Uhr morgens (ja, ich habe endlich Ferien) zu lesen. Hierbei ist das Buch auch sehr schnell und flüssig durch den Stil, der zwischen Teenie und Adult balanciert.
Auch die Wahl von Olive als Erzählerin der Geschichte ist eine sehr gute gewesen, auch wenn es bei obiger Inhaltsangabe so erscheint, als wäre Katie eine bessere Wahl gewesen. Jedoch ist Olive aufgrund all dem, was sie erlebt hat und was sie ausmacht, eine sehr viel interessantere Protagonistin. Sie muss Tabletten nehmen, hat eine gewisse Zeit in der Klinik verbracht, und isoliert sich sehr stark von ihren Schulkameraden, ebenso wie von ihrer Familie. Aus diesem Grund ist es sehr spannend, Stück für Stück herauszufinden, was sich in ihrer Vergangenheit zugetragen hat, um sie zu dem Menschen werden zu lassen, der sie ist, und wegen dieser Ausgefallenheit ist sie einem auch sehr sympathisch. Natürlich besitzt sie ihre Makel, jedoch stören diese kaum und unterstreichen nur noch, wie fragil sie eigentlich ist, jedoch entschlossen ist zu kämpfen. Anfangs habe ich persönlich mich etwas darüber gewundert, dass sie so augenblicklich ein Interesse an Miranda entwickelt, da sie etwas obsessiv rübergekommen ist, jedoch habe ich sie im Laufe des Buches wirklich zu mögen gelernt und bin mir sicher, dass viele andere dies auch tun werden, vor allem aufgrund ihrer Entwicklung.
Auch alle anderen Charaktere sind sehr interessant gestaltet und wirken zunächst vielleicht so, als stellten sie Stereotypen dar, jedoch wird man sich äußerst schnell bewusst, dass man da vorschnell geurteilt hat. Vor allem Olive's Familie und ihre beste Freundin Ami sind sehr sympathisch und schaffen es, einen immer wieder zu überraschen. Auch Lachlan, der anfangs gewirkt hat wie der typische beliebte Sportlertyp, hat sich als ein sehr netter und überhaupt nicht eingebildeter Typ erwiesen, ebenso wie Katie, Olive's ehemalige beste Freundin und Queen Bee der High School.
Der dennoch faszinierendste Charakter für mich ist jedoch Miranda. Man könnte sie auch gut mit dem Bermudadreieck vergleichen: Sie strahlt etwas Gefährliches und gleichzeitig Reizendes aus, scheint hierbei jedoch eine Figur zu sein, von der man sich nicht sicher sein kann, ob sie tatsächlich existiert oder nicht. Das Mädchen verhält sich so, als seien ihr keine Grenzen gesetzt, kommt mit allem durch, dass sie sich in den Kopf setzt, und wirkt so, als hätte sie in irgendeiner Weise magische Fähigkeiten, mit deren Hilfe sie alles wahr werden lässt, was sie sich wünscht. Insofern kann man verstehen, warum sie Olive fasziniert, jedoch hat sie mir auch einen kalten Schauer den Rücken runterlaufen lassen, weil sie einfach derartig irreal erscheint, dass man sich nicht sicher ist, ob man sich hier nun in einem Fantasy- oder Contemporaryroman befindet. Wie sonst, wenn nicht mit übermenschlichen Kräften, könnte man sich so derartig viele Details merken, gewisse Dinge herbekommen und es ermöglichen, ein Leben ohne irgendwelche Regelungen zu führen? Ist Miranda einfach nur ein sehr rebellischer und psychotischer Teenager, der verzweifelt nach Selbstbestätigung sucht, indem er anderen das Leben klaut und sie dazu bringt, sie zu beneiden? Oder verbirgt sich vielleicht eine mythologische Kreatur hinter diesem Mädchen, das so schnell und so perfekt Menschen imitieren kann und das ungewöhnlich viele Menschen in einer Stadt kennt, in der es vorher niemals gewesen ist?
Dass bis zum Ende nicht klar ist, wer Miranda eigentlich ist, macht dieses Buch auch so derartig spannend. Stück für Stück erfährt man Details, die einen zwischen der einen und der anderen Theorie hin und her schwanken lassen, und man kann gar nicht anders als weiterzulesen, weil es derart verstrickt ist, dass man wirklich keinen blassen Schimmer hat, was in diesem Buch eigentlich passiert. Ebenso spannend ist zu verfolgen, wie Mirandas Opfer sich einlullen lassen und wie diese darangeht, ihnen scheinbar jede Lebenslust und -kraft auszusaugen. Außer dem Fall Miranda verfolgt man außerdem noch Olive's Leben mit, das zwar nicht aus Dingen besteht, die die Herzen aller typischen Mädchen höherschlagen lassen, jedoch bekommt man auch hier Stück für Stück ihre Geschichte mit und findet diese vor allem wegen den psychologischen Aspekten interessant. Denn durch Vieles, was Olive erlebt und erzählt, stellt man sich selbst die Frage, ob Personen, Dinge oder Konflikte in diesem Buch tatsächlich existieren. Dies kommt zum einen durch die vorher beschriebene Atmosphäre, zum anderen wegen gewissen Wendepunkten zustande, die einen daran zweifeln lassen, ob Olive das Gespür für die Realität überhaupt noch besitzt.
Ein spannungsreicher, stimmiger und psychologischer Thriller also. Perfekter könnte es doch eigentlich nicht sein, richtig?
Leider doch. Denn so gut ich es finde, dass man keine Ahnung hat, welchem Genre dieses Buch denn nun angehört und ob dieses ganze Geschehen überhaupt existiert und was mit Miranda nicht in Ordnung ist, so sehr hasse ich die Tatsache, dass nicht eine einzige dieser Fragen beantwortet wird. Aus diesem Grund betonte ich auch, dass der Titel für dieses Buch so wunderbar passt: Man hat keine Ahnung, welchem Genre das Buch angehört, was in diesem Buch real ist und was nicht und was nun genau Miranda ist: Mensch oder übernatürlich? Es ist so, als hätte Em Bailey ein Wetter wie vor dem Ausbruchs eines Sturms erschaffen: Es ist schwül, man bekommt Kopfschmerzen, die Atmosphäre ist drückend und geladen und man sehnt die Erlösung des Regens herbei ... dieser kommt allerdings nicht. Insofern kann das Buch einen sehr unbefriedigt zurücklassen, weil damit nicht klar ist, ob das Buch denn somit all das aufgebauschte Potential tatsächlich ausgeschöpft hat. Mich zumindest hat dieser Faktor wahnsinnig gestört und dieses sonst so wahnsinnig gute Buch in den Dreck gezogen.
Letzten Endes besitzt dieser Thriller eigentlich alles, was ein guter Thriller braucht: originelle und sympathische Charaktere, eine gewisse emotionale Tiefe, die durch all die Tragik und die Verluste entstehen, außerdem noch das Gefühl, dass nichts so ist, wie es scheint, und einen Plot, der einem bis zum Ende des Buches ein großes Geheimnis bleibt. Doch wie genau soll man ein Buch bewerten, das man wegen dem fehlendem Abschluss bzw. der fehlenden Auflösung nicht einordnen kann? Auch wenn ich vor dem Lesen dieses Buches dachte, man könnte eine Geschichte nie zu verschachtelt gestalten - Em Bailey hat es geschafft, diese von mir aufgestellte These umzuwerfen. Ein sehr gutes Buch, dem allerdings der letztliche Schlussstrich oder irgendein finaler Hinweis definitiv nicht geschadet hätte. Insgesamt also zum Haareraufen.
Gesamtpunktzahl: 4.00/5.00
Mehr Rezensionen von mir unter sanas-version.blogspot.de
March 28, 2017
This book was incredibly thrilling and kept you wanting to read more, however some parts of the book was a little bit unrealistic and made it hard to picture.
January 17, 2024
This book did everything it was meant to do. It messed with my head and it made me hate Miranda with a passion. I would read it again 100%.
April 18, 2020
Well, advertised as a “gripping, romantic, psychological thriller”, I can safely say that this book checks none of those boxes. Not one.
This book follows Olive, an Australian ex-popular teenage girl with certain mental health issues as she observes new girl Miranda suck the life out of her ex-best-friend-turned-bully literally. I think this premise has a lot of potential. You don’t often read a book about someone somehow sucking the life out of someone else. However, it was incredibly poorly executed.
The novel reads like two novellas slapped together with the same idea but in one the narrator is an observer and in the other, the narrator is the main victim. Where most stories read like a dromedary of sorts, with a climax, a rise and a fall, this book reads like a camel, two bumps, two story arcs that are basically identical save the change of point of view. This makes it really frustrating (because the main character still acts like an idiot throughout both parts but especially the second one despite all that she has learnt in the first part) and basically devoid of interest. Nothing of particular interest, no plot twists no character development that couldn’t have appeared in the first part had the author copied and pasted a couple of paragraphs happens in the second part.
But that’s not all. For instance, there is the fact that all the “plot twists” without exception were predictable, heightening the reader’s frustration as they wait for the narrator to catch up to basic logic.
While the narrator’s unreliableness was good, the author ruined it by having another character confirm the wild speculations near the end. This means that for the narrator to be unreliable, she needs to have invented a dialogue with an actual character, which is a little bit more far-fetched than if she had just made up wild (unconfirmed) accusations. It’s still possible, just more unlikely.
What’s more, the romance was in my opinion fucking terrible. The guy who’s interested in Olive, Lachlan (who is by the way too perfect to the point where he just feels like a fantasy that a 12 year old would make up in her head), takes an interest to her very fast and within the first conversation they have he asks her out. How does the author make this drag out during the whole book you ask? By writing a terrible romance of course. Olive’s immediate reaction is basically I’m so ugly it must be a prank. Ok if your self-esteem is that low, I won’t judge. However, she keeps pushing him away during the ENTIRE book. Then, every time he thought process goes like this: Oh he’s actually leaving? I’m sad now because I like him. But wait he’s coming back yay! Oh this must be a prank because I’m so ugly. This was infuriating for me, because they only thing stopping them from getting together was the narrator, and I just wanted to slap her by the end. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that having low self-esteem in a main character impede on a relationship is always bad, but it can’t be the only problem, they need to talk through it and in this case it was just infuriating.
By extension, I just kept wondering why the hell he kept coming back. I mean, he didn’t know her all that well, yet his feelings for her were so strong (unrealistically strong). He fucking deserved better than this girl who pushed him away so much.
Lastly, and this is honestly just a pet peeve, but I had to talk about it. Something that angered me (a bit unreasonably) is a tiny detail. Olive often takes care of her little brother on evenings because her mother works a lot. On developing a friendship with Miranda, she would often put him to bed then sneak out at night to go to gigs, despite her brother having a history of nightmares and waking up crying. Miranda tells her that her mother is taking advantage of her and that she should be paid, and Olive agrees??? What the fuck. At the end of the book, the mother agrees that she has been taking her daughter for granted and decides to pay her. What. The. Actual. Fuck. No. Taking care of your family is not a job. It’s a normal thing to do. You can get paid for it if that’s how your family wants it to work, but on no account to you DESERVE to get paid for helping out your mother (who what’s more is single with two children and juggling lots of things at once). You especially don’t deserve that when you’ve been acting irresponsibly and leaving your brother in the middle of the night. NO.
This book is a YA thriller. In my opinion, the only differences there should be between YA and adult thrillers are to do with things like the age of the main character, the subjects treated (for example high school or mid-life crisis) etc… By no means can slapping the word YA on the back of a book act as a reason to rehash the same story twice across the book, make the plot twists unbelievably obvious or put little to no effort in the romance. There is no excuse for poor writing.
This book follows Olive, an Australian ex-popular teenage girl with certain mental health issues as she observes new girl Miranda suck the life out of her ex-best-friend-turned-bully literally. I think this premise has a lot of potential. You don’t often read a book about someone somehow sucking the life out of someone else. However, it was incredibly poorly executed.
The novel reads like two novellas slapped together with the same idea but in one the narrator is an observer and in the other, the narrator is the main victim. Where most stories read like a dromedary of sorts, with a climax, a rise and a fall, this book reads like a camel, two bumps, two story arcs that are basically identical save the change of point of view. This makes it really frustrating (because the main character still acts like an idiot throughout both parts but especially the second one despite all that she has learnt in the first part) and basically devoid of interest. Nothing of particular interest, no plot twists no character development that couldn’t have appeared in the first part had the author copied and pasted a couple of paragraphs happens in the second part.
But that’s not all. For instance, there is the fact that all the “plot twists” without exception were predictable, heightening the reader’s frustration as they wait for the narrator to catch up to basic logic.
While the narrator’s unreliableness was good, the author ruined it by having another character confirm the wild speculations near the end. This means that for the narrator to be unreliable, she needs to have invented a dialogue with an actual character, which is a little bit more far-fetched than if she had just made up wild (unconfirmed) accusations. It’s still possible, just more unlikely.
What’s more, the romance was in my opinion fucking terrible. The guy who’s interested in Olive, Lachlan (who is by the way too perfect to the point where he just feels like a fantasy that a 12 year old would make up in her head), takes an interest to her very fast and within the first conversation they have he asks her out. How does the author make this drag out during the whole book you ask? By writing a terrible romance of course. Olive’s immediate reaction is basically I’m so ugly it must be a prank. Ok if your self-esteem is that low, I won’t judge. However, she keeps pushing him away during the ENTIRE book. Then, every time he thought process goes like this: Oh he’s actually leaving? I’m sad now because I like him. But wait he’s coming back yay! Oh this must be a prank because I’m so ugly. This was infuriating for me, because they only thing stopping them from getting together was the narrator, and I just wanted to slap her by the end. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that having low self-esteem in a main character impede on a relationship is always bad, but it can’t be the only problem, they need to talk through it and in this case it was just infuriating.
By extension, I just kept wondering why the hell he kept coming back. I mean, he didn’t know her all that well, yet his feelings for her were so strong (unrealistically strong). He fucking deserved better than this girl who pushed him away so much.
Lastly, and this is honestly just a pet peeve, but I had to talk about it. Something that angered me (a bit unreasonably) is a tiny detail. Olive often takes care of her little brother on evenings because her mother works a lot. On developing a friendship with Miranda, she would often put him to bed then sneak out at night to go to gigs, despite her brother having a history of nightmares and waking up crying. Miranda tells her that her mother is taking advantage of her and that she should be paid, and Olive agrees??? What the fuck. At the end of the book, the mother agrees that she has been taking her daughter for granted and decides to pay her. What. The. Actual. Fuck. No. Taking care of your family is not a job. It’s a normal thing to do. You can get paid for it if that’s how your family wants it to work, but on no account to you DESERVE to get paid for helping out your mother (who what’s more is single with two children and juggling lots of things at once). You especially don’t deserve that when you’ve been acting irresponsibly and leaving your brother in the middle of the night. NO.
This book is a YA thriller. In my opinion, the only differences there should be between YA and adult thrillers are to do with things like the age of the main character, the subjects treated (for example high school or mid-life crisis) etc… By no means can slapping the word YA on the back of a book act as a reason to rehash the same story twice across the book, make the plot twists unbelievably obvious or put little to no effort in the romance. There is no excuse for poor writing.
November 1, 2011
Review posted at
Amaterasu Reads
Em Bailey's chilling psychological YA thriller debut is sure to make readers think twice about letting people get close too much. The bonds of friendship is stretched tight up to the breaking point in this shuddery tale of one girl's identity and her struggle to find out who she really is deep inside.
Olivia Corbett's life is a wreck. She used to be best friends with Katie, the most popular girl in school. She used to be pretty, outgoing, with a happy family, but after the "Incident", Olive doesn't even recognize who she was anymore. Shunned, different, fat, crazy, on medication, with a brother having nightmares every night and a mother left by her husband. All she has is Ami, and she sure doesn't want anyone else getting close, especially the new boy in school, Lachlan, who thinks he knows who she truly was inside. How could he? Things were fine until Miranda arrived. Miranda, the rumored killer. Soon popular Katie is fading into the background, and Miranda's stealing everything away from her, including her life. Now Katie's dead and Miranda is still there, waiting for her next victim. And now she has her sights set on Olive...
Olive wasn't crazy, that I'm sure of. Extremely paranoid, but not crazy. People tend to obsess about how other people perceive them, and in Olive's case that drove her to the edge of her sanity. She had a difficult time dealing with her emotions, and what she had become when she was friends with Katie. She knew she was wrecking lives, not just of her friends but also of her family. Maybe she was partly to blame for what happened, but what was important was that she tried to change, and I admire her for that.
Surprise came into the form of Ami. She was a particular twist in the story I wasn't anticipating at all. It's always a delight to be able to read a book where surprise plot twists appear out of nowhere. The unpredictability adds to the charm of this book and the fact that the characters are highly flawed. It makes you feel the realness of each and every single one of them and adds to the real life aspect of the book.
And Lachlan, oh Lachlan, where do I start describing you? He's the lifesaver, literally. He rescued Olive from all the evils of her life. For someone as unstable as Olive, Lachlan is the stability she needs. It's a given that he's gorgeous, but he's strong and understanding and he sees Olive for what she really is. He's the kind of guy you wish was real because he's not interested in the superficial beauty of a girl, instead he you for the person you are inside.
A valuable lesson this book teaches is to be wary of choosing who you'll be friends with. Olive watched as Katie wasted away in Miranda's grasps and she almost fell for Miranda's madness as well. From the mousy, new kid, Miranda slowly took all that Katie had. It's chilling to the bone to read of a person who's manipulative streak appears in full force. For Miranda, words held power, and she may not be an alien, but she's certainly a 'shapeshifter'. A real menace. She twists and bends and shape a person the way she likes them to be, someone inferior to her, and kill them with her words and ideas, often toxic and deadly. She plays with emotions. She toys with people's lives. She gets satisfaction in the demise of her so called friends. I cannot believe such a person can exist.
Shift is one of the most intense YA psychological thriller I've read this year. This book is not for the faint hearted. Shift is a spine chilling tale about the dark and distorted side of friendship and all the things that could possibly go wrong. It takes the readers to a gripping ride into the ugly mind of the viciously wicked. Shift will mess up your mind. It will frighten you. Fear is a great motivator, and that is what you will mostly feel while reading this book. But don't worry, as this book is not just about the evilness of one's heart or the ugly side of friendship, but also of family and first love and a story about how we look at ourselves, how we treat ourselves and how we love ourselves.
A healthy dose of creepiness combined with a generous amount of volatile moments and emotions gave birth to this terrific novel. What a way to introduce Em Bailey to the writing world!
Em Bailey is an author to watch out for! Shift is a masterful and mind blowing debut! Believe me when I say that this book will just not give you the creeps, but it will make you take a close look at how you form relationships and probably make us a little wiser and more cautious of forming bonds with the right people.
Em Bailey's chilling psychological YA thriller debut is sure to make readers think twice about letting people get close too much. The bonds of friendship is stretched tight up to the breaking point in this shuddery tale of one girl's identity and her struggle to find out who she really is deep inside.
Olivia Corbett's life is a wreck. She used to be best friends with Katie, the most popular girl in school. She used to be pretty, outgoing, with a happy family, but after the "Incident", Olive doesn't even recognize who she was anymore. Shunned, different, fat, crazy, on medication, with a brother having nightmares every night and a mother left by her husband. All she has is Ami, and she sure doesn't want anyone else getting close, especially the new boy in school, Lachlan, who thinks he knows who she truly was inside. How could he? Things were fine until Miranda arrived. Miranda, the rumored killer. Soon popular Katie is fading into the background, and Miranda's stealing everything away from her, including her life. Now Katie's dead and Miranda is still there, waiting for her next victim. And now she has her sights set on Olive...
Olive wasn't crazy, that I'm sure of. Extremely paranoid, but not crazy. People tend to obsess about how other people perceive them, and in Olive's case that drove her to the edge of her sanity. She had a difficult time dealing with her emotions, and what she had become when she was friends with Katie. She knew she was wrecking lives, not just of her friends but also of her family. Maybe she was partly to blame for what happened, but what was important was that she tried to change, and I admire her for that.
Surprise came into the form of Ami. She was a particular twist in the story I wasn't anticipating at all. It's always a delight to be able to read a book where surprise plot twists appear out of nowhere. The unpredictability adds to the charm of this book and the fact that the characters are highly flawed. It makes you feel the realness of each and every single one of them and adds to the real life aspect of the book.
And Lachlan, oh Lachlan, where do I start describing you? He's the lifesaver, literally. He rescued Olive from all the evils of her life. For someone as unstable as Olive, Lachlan is the stability she needs. It's a given that he's gorgeous, but he's strong and understanding and he sees Olive for what she really is. He's the kind of guy you wish was real because he's not interested in the superficial beauty of a girl, instead he you for the person you are inside.
A valuable lesson this book teaches is to be wary of choosing who you'll be friends with. Olive watched as Katie wasted away in Miranda's grasps and she almost fell for Miranda's madness as well. From the mousy, new kid, Miranda slowly took all that Katie had. It's chilling to the bone to read of a person who's manipulative streak appears in full force. For Miranda, words held power, and she may not be an alien, but she's certainly a 'shapeshifter'. A real menace. She twists and bends and shape a person the way she likes them to be, someone inferior to her, and kill them with her words and ideas, often toxic and deadly. She plays with emotions. She toys with people's lives. She gets satisfaction in the demise of her so called friends. I cannot believe such a person can exist.
Shift is one of the most intense YA psychological thriller I've read this year. This book is not for the faint hearted. Shift is a spine chilling tale about the dark and distorted side of friendship and all the things that could possibly go wrong. It takes the readers to a gripping ride into the ugly mind of the viciously wicked. Shift will mess up your mind. It will frighten you. Fear is a great motivator, and that is what you will mostly feel while reading this book. But don't worry, as this book is not just about the evilness of one's heart or the ugly side of friendship, but also of family and first love and a story about how we look at ourselves, how we treat ourselves and how we love ourselves.
A healthy dose of creepiness combined with a generous amount of volatile moments and emotions gave birth to this terrific novel. What a way to introduce Em Bailey to the writing world!
Em Bailey is an author to watch out for! Shift is a masterful and mind blowing debut! Believe me when I say that this book will just not give you the creeps, but it will make you take a close look at how you form relationships and probably make us a little wiser and more cautious of forming bonds with the right people.
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July 8, 2012
I felt so let down by this book. I had been SUPER excited to read it, and I had heard such good things. But there were too many things lacking for me.
The story line. Original. Amazing. I should have loved it. But other than the base story-line, of Miranda 'becoming' other people, none of the smaller story lines fit. I felt as though the romance between Lachlan and Olive was completely forgotten about, and then all that was talked about. Which was a shame because I really liked Lachlan and would have liked him to be featured more in the story.
But, as I said, the whole idea of Miranda 'becoming' other people, was so new and gripping that I couldn't help but read on. Why does she do that? Who is she really? There was so many questions I wanted to know the answers to. And, strangely, I liked Miranda... We're left wondering whether she really did kill those people [her parents, Katie, the death near the end], or if it was just a coincidence... I know what I believe, but I still felt drawn to Miranda, in a weird and twisted way.
The point where everything fell apart from me is when Olive and Miranda become friends. From there, everything is predictable and unbelievable. And that's what ruined the book for me. Because, before that, everything was amazing! It was gripping, it was pulling you in, it was so new and I wanted MORE. The whole friendship between Miranda and Katie was amazing, it was so believable and clever. And AMI! AMI! Okay, well Ami was amazing.
So I would recommend you read this book, I really would. Because so much of it was a shockingly brilliant. It was just the later parts that made it fall apart. So be wary of those, but DO PICK UP THIS BOOK. And the cover is so super pretty that it is definitely worth buying. (:
The story line. Original. Amazing. I should have loved it. But other than the base story-line, of Miranda 'becoming' other people, none of the smaller story lines fit. I felt as though the romance between Lachlan and Olive was completely forgotten about, and then all that was talked about. Which was a shame because I really liked Lachlan and would have liked him to be featured more in the story.
But, as I said, the whole idea of Miranda 'becoming' other people, was so new and gripping that I couldn't help but read on. Why does she do that? Who is she really? There was so many questions I wanted to know the answers to. And, strangely, I liked Miranda... We're left wondering whether she really did kill those people [her parents, Katie, the death near the end], or if it was just a coincidence... I know what I believe, but I still felt drawn to Miranda, in a weird and twisted way.
The point where everything fell apart from me is when Olive and Miranda become friends. From there, everything is predictable and unbelievable. And that's what ruined the book for me. Because, before that, everything was amazing! It was gripping, it was pulling you in, it was so new and I wanted MORE. The whole friendship between Miranda and Katie was amazing, it was so believable and clever. And AMI! AMI! Okay, well Ami was amazing.
So I would recommend you read this book, I really would. Because so much of it was a shockingly brilliant. It was just the later parts that made it fall apart. So be wary of those, but DO PICK UP THIS BOOK. And the cover is so super pretty that it is definitely worth buying. (:
July 20, 2016
Right. I'm going to bullet point my thoughts because CBA to articulate them properly. I'm just too angry.
I had really high hopes for this book. I really thought I would like it. That said, I did like Lachlan. I just wish I could have gotten more of the romance I was promised (granted, I DNF'd this book so I can't speak for it, but I did skim read to the scene where they kiss and it was good. That's one of the best scenes in the whole book.)
Ok, so here's what i didn't like:
Underdeveloped characters so i didn't care about them.
Weird plonked in "temporary psychosis' that had no back up in the story. i think the term you're looking for is PTSD.
Olive being mean to her love interest and then wondering why he was no longer interested.
No development of relationships between Katie and Olive - I feel like if we'd seen how they were before, i would have cared more.
Recycling of plot between Katie and Miranda and Olive and Miranda.
And Olive just went along with Miranda with no thoughts like "am i being manipulated like Katie probably was?" (which there was overwhelming evidence for?!)
No evidence of the mother being controlling even after the big fight they had where Olive finds out her mums the one that caused her dad to leave etc.
Shitty writing. (You need to SHOW, not TELL. Literally everything was spoon fed for us as it happened. The reader didn't need to work anything out for themselves.) All this may be covered in other reviews and as I say I can't properly judge b/c I DNFd it but that says a lot to me about how i liked it - I couldn't take reading it ONE MORE MINUTE.
I had really high hopes for this book. I really thought I would like it. That said, I did like Lachlan. I just wish I could have gotten more of the romance I was promised (granted, I DNF'd this book so I can't speak for it, but I did skim read to the scene where they kiss and it was good. That's one of the best scenes in the whole book.)
Ok, so here's what i didn't like:
Underdeveloped characters so i didn't care about them.
Weird plonked in "temporary psychosis' that had no back up in the story. i think the term you're looking for is PTSD.
Olive being mean to her love interest and then wondering why he was no longer interested.
No development of relationships between Katie and Olive - I feel like if we'd seen how they were before, i would have cared more.
Recycling of plot between Katie and Miranda and Olive and Miranda.
And Olive just went along with Miranda with no thoughts like "am i being manipulated like Katie probably was?" (which there was overwhelming evidence for?!)
No evidence of the mother being controlling even after the big fight they had where Olive finds out her mums the one that caused her dad to leave etc.
Shitty writing. (You need to SHOW, not TELL. Literally everything was spoon fed for us as it happened. The reader didn't need to work anything out for themselves.) All this may be covered in other reviews and as I say I can't properly judge b/c I DNFd it but that says a lot to me about how i liked it - I couldn't take reading it ONE MORE MINUTE.
March 14, 2015
It all started out so well. A person who 'shifts' into another person's personality once they take that persons belongings sounds creepy, but really interesting. But it didn't live up to my expectations.
I saw the twist with Olive's friend Ami coming from quite early on. I really like Ami and maybe that's because that's the nickname I call my bestfriend Amy. No I just thought she was a fun character, too bad about the truth...
I also thought it was strange that Olive was so suspicious of Miranda for so long and then with a little explanation from Miranda about her behaviour Olive totally changes her attitude and believes her lies! I couldn't believe she fell for it.
I liked this book enough to give it 3 stars, but I felt it was a bit weak compared to other YA books I've read that are similar. It was just a bit blah...
I saw the twist with Olive's friend Ami coming from quite early on. I really like Ami and maybe that's because that's the nickname I call my bestfriend Amy. No I just thought she was a fun character, too bad about the truth...
I also thought it was strange that Olive was so suspicious of Miranda for so long and then with a little explanation from Miranda about her behaviour Olive totally changes her attitude and believes her lies! I couldn't believe she fell for it.
I liked this book enough to give it 3 stars, but I felt it was a bit weak compared to other YA books I've read that are similar. It was just a bit blah...
January 28, 2012
Woah. That is all I can say. This book is absolutely phenomenal in every aspect. While I was on holidays I went to a book shop looking for something to entertain me on my upcoming 6 hour drive. This book was reccomended to me by a woman there. Now I usually don't go for the supernatural stuff but I gave it a go. This book was an exception. Absolutely FANTASTIC!!!!!
You feel so drawn to the characters and as soon as you have read the first two pages you will be filled with anticipation and your eyes will be glued to the pages. If you enjoy young adult fiction and you haven't read this already you are missing out on a life! Get your hands on a copy!
It is thrilling, suspenseful and utterly sensational.
You feel so drawn to the characters and as soon as you have read the first two pages you will be filled with anticipation and your eyes will be glued to the pages. If you enjoy young adult fiction and you haven't read this already you are missing out on a life! Get your hands on a copy!
It is thrilling, suspenseful and utterly sensational.
July 28, 2017
Olive used to be popular. Now she isn't, but we're not told exactly why. However, her ex-best friend Katie is a crucial part of her story.
When new girl Miranda moves to the school people are convinced she murdered her parents. Slowly, she ingratiated herself into the school environment and soon becomes friends with those people that Olive is so suspicious of.
Through a number of events/devices we get to know just what Miranda is capable of. The question is whether Olive will trust herself in time.
This book wasn't particularly tense as the 'reveals' were rather obvious, but the character of Olive was interesting. I don't usually like such open-ended resolutions to a story, but for this it was fitting.
When new girl Miranda moves to the school people are convinced she murdered her parents. Slowly, she ingratiated herself into the school environment and soon becomes friends with those people that Olive is so suspicious of.
Through a number of events/devices we get to know just what Miranda is capable of. The question is whether Olive will trust herself in time.
This book wasn't particularly tense as the 'reveals' were rather obvious, but the character of Olive was interesting. I don't usually like such open-ended resolutions to a story, but for this it was fitting.
December 28, 2019
This is one of those books that you pick up intending to read a few pages, and suddenly you're reaching the end without ever having even shifted position once.
It completely sucks you in, in all the right ways. It's a great psychological thriller, and it's even YA. It has depth and emotion, and yet still has that almost predictable train-wreck feeling that lots of YA has. It's the best of both YA teen drama and adult thriller mind-f*ck.
If this is the last book I read this year, I'll be happy. It's an amazing read.
It completely sucks you in, in all the right ways. It's a great psychological thriller, and it's even YA. It has depth and emotion, and yet still has that almost predictable train-wreck feeling that lots of YA has. It's the best of both YA teen drama and adult thriller mind-f*ck.
If this is the last book I read this year, I'll be happy. It's an amazing read.
June 1, 2020
It was fine, but nothing I would recommend to others. It felt like a 13year old made up the storyline and also the language, was pretty easy to read. Those are probably the target audience, so you could say it fits. Still I do not think it is great, also the moral message of it is way to obvious and feel like a slash hammer and the twists are to easy to predict. Although, I do acknowledge the rather unique story idea.
March 31, 2016
This book freaked me out at first to be honest, but I really liked it. It was interesting and I just didn't know what to expect. Even now that I've finished it I have no idea what Miranda actually was or what to expect...
July 27, 2019
I loved this book, its one of those books that you can't put down. I read this on holiday and I finished it in 5 days. Its an interesting book and have never read a book like it. I would definitely read from this author again.
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