Saturday, December 5, 2015

The Farm by Tom Rob Smith

Still in the process of finishing the second book of the Game of Throne series; however, I decided to be a little rebellious and change the material I was reading every night before going to bed. With all the textbook and article reading at school, I definitely needed a change from elevated language that required me to look up a word every five seconds or so to something familiar, plausible, and easier to wrap my head around. I found this break in the mystery section at the library...

Specifically, I found my savior in (drum roll please) Tom Rob Smith's The Farm.














Nowadays, I feel like people are more interested in the long titles and they fail to place equal fascination for books with succinct titles such as this book. This book kept me sane throughout the first semester of junior year; however, its insanely complex plot kept me awake and sleep deprived for most of the first semester of junior year -- and I am not complaining. Let me explain...

My Ratings:
Vocabulary:  *****
Ingredients: *****
Satisfaction: *****
Lexile Level: N/A but I would say about 1000HL 
Genre:  Mystery, Psychological Thriller, Realistic Fiction
My Opinions: Imagine getting a frantic call from your father, the man you believed to be headed into a peaceful, well-deserved retirement with his wife. The man who had sold his home in London to move into a remote farm in rural Sweden with his wife. However, that one phone call changes everything.

He tells you that your mother is not in a good mental state and has been falling into episodes of hallucination. He informs you that she just had a psychotic breakdown. He promises you that she has been imagining terrible, terrible things and had to be rushed to the hospital. Worst of all, right before you decide to fly to Sweden, your father calls to tell you that she had just escaped and no one knows where she is.

Coincidentally, you hear from your mother telling you to believe no one and to meet her in London.

These two are your loving parents; they've raised you since the second you were out in the world; nurtured you; developed you; loved you; trusted you. Both seem unlikely criminals yet you are caught in the middle of this puzzling situation, a web of lies, secrets, conspiracies -- unsure of who to believe or trust.

This is the situation Daniel is in.

I had to force myself to turn off the lights and go to sleep each night because this book literally pulled me like a magnet the minute I opened it. With the book being mostly from the perspective of the mother, Smith does a really really good job of coaxing the reader into entering the mind and life of the characters. Smith keeps the reader guessing by fostering an atmosphere of tension and unease. Well-developed characters and a masterful plot are just a few reasons for my five star rating. It is a must read if you are looking for a psychological thriller.

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