Author: Carrie Jones and Steven Wedel
Pages: 320 pgs
Genre: YA, Paranormal
Release Date: September 13th 2011
Review Source: Bloomsbury USA Childrens ARC
After Obsession is a debut collaboration between Carrie Jones and Steven Wedel, but certainly isn't their first work as authors. I was definitely surprised by this story and in the end I think that was a good thing.
Strange things are happening in the small town Aimee Avery lives in and when her best friend's cousin Alan moves in, they become even more difficult to ignore. No one acts like themselves and the only person Aimee can seem to trust is Alan.
They both have secrets they don't want anyone else to know about, secrets that bring the two of them closer together. Secrets that will help them fight the thing that's making everybody crazy, including Aimee's best friend and Alan's cousin, Courtney.
One of the things I really like about this story was that Carrie wrote Aimee's character and Steven wrote Alan's. So, obviously, you could see the differences in how the story was told, but they each brought something great to that character. And the subtlety of how they grew and changed throughout the story was very well done.
Changes around the town are slowly mentioned. People are meaner, fights are happening and school and at work. Things are just different and no one can understand why. It's not heavily focused on, but it's mentioned throughout, adding to the already strange things that Alan and Aimee witness.
This also wasn't a typical possession story, using more of the Navajo teachings to deal with it. I liked that it was different. It's a little dark, a little romantic, a little bit of everything for readers and offers an interesting story. Even the connection that Aimee and Alan have is more than a typical story would offer. The secrets that they carry and the danger around town adding to it.
There's so much more to it than the summary gives you and I don't want to give that away. It wasn't what I was expecting at first, which I'm happy about. Each character had a strong voice and added a little something extra to the story.
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