Blog Tour: Review & Giveaway ~ Dead Dreams by Emma Right

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Title: Dead Dreams

Series: Dead Dreams #1

Author: Emma Right

Re-release date: October 2013

Genre: Young Adult, Mystery, Psychological Thriller

Source: Review copy

Blog Tour Organized by: IFB Tours

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~ Synopsis ~

Eighteen-year-old Brie O'Mara has so much going for her: a loving family in the sidelines, an heiress for a roommate, and dreams that might just come true. Big dreams - of going to acting school, finishing college and making a name for herself. She is about to be the envy of everyone she knew. What more could she hope for? Except her dreams are about to lead her down the road to nightmares. Nightmares that could turn into a deadly reality. 

~ My Thoughts ~

My Rating: 5 / 5 

Dead Dreams, from the cover, looks like it would be a paranormal kind of novel, but surprisingly not! I checked the genre again just to be sure even though it's clearly stated on the cover that this is a psychological thriller. It was definitely thrilling to read - I felt like I was holding my breath throughout the entire novel!

I enjoyed taking a break from the paranormal genre for Dead Dreams. Brie has moved out on her own into an apartment and advertised for a roommate on Craigslist. When I read that, I couldn't help but facepalm. Craigslist? Really? That'd be the last place I'd advertise for a roommate even if I was end-of-the-rope desperate. After an interview, Brie has found her roommate, who happens to be an heiress. An heiress on Craigslist?? 

A lot of this wasn't making sense to me, but not in an irritating way. It was in an oh-my-God-watch-out-Brie kind of way. I could have kept a tally of all the mistakes Brie makes that I wish she hadn't made in the first place. Sprinkled here and there throughout the novel are hints from Brie that this isn't going to end well for her. I don't know exactly how or when but that something really bad is going to end up happening. It was inevitable. 

While Brie questions her roommate's secrecy and the lies she catches her in, Brie still continues to trust her and doesn't listen to the gut feeling she has that something is very wrong. The situation Brie is in along with the decisions she made had me thinking this was a huge scam, but I couldn't figure out the roommate's angle. What would she have to gain from tricking Brie? The first time I caught my roommate in a lie I wouldn't be able to trust her or explain it away like Brie did. 

Things escalate quickly, and I practically chewed my fingernails. I had no clue what was going to happen and tried to put the pieces together as I went along. This is an extremely gripping read that snatches you up from page one and doesn't let go until the end. And even after that, you aren't going to be able to stop thinking about this one for quite a while!   

  

~ Purchase Link ~

Amazon

~ About the Author: Emma Right ~

Emma Right is a happy wife and homeschool mother of five living in the Pacific West Coast. Besides running a busy home, and looking after too many pets, she also enjoys reading aloud to her children and often has her nose in a book. Right was a copywriter for a major advertising agency during her B.C. years. B.C. meaning "Before Children," which may as well have been in the B.C. era, as she always says. 

~ Social Links ~

Website | Twitter | Facebook 

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Book Blast ~ Dead Dreams by Emma Right

Title: Dead Dreams Book #1 
Author: Emma Right
Publisher: Right House Books
Print Length: 170 pages
ASIN: B00ESVEVBQ
Book Blast organized by: b00k r3vi3w Tours

Eighteen-year-old Brie O’Mara has so much going for her: a loving family in the sidelines, an heiress for a roommate, and dreams that might just come true. Big dreams--of going to acting school, finishing college and making a name for herself. She is about to be the envy of everyone she knew. What more could she hope for? Except her dreams are about to lead her down the road to nightmares. Nightmares that could turn into a deadly reality.

Dead Dreams, Book 1, a young adult psychological thriller and mystery.

Excerpt

Chapter One

It started on a warm April afternoon. Gusts of wind blew against the oak tree right outside my kitchen balcony, in my tiny apartment in Atherton, California. Sometimes the branches that touched the side of the building made scraping noises. The yellow huckleberry flowers twining their way across my apartment balcony infused the air with sweetness.

My mother had insisted, as was her tendency on most things, I take the pot of wild huckleberry, her housewarming gift, to my new two-bedroom apartment. It wasn’t really new, just new to me, as was the entire experience of living separately, away from my family, and the prospect of having a roommate, someone who could be a best friend, something I’d dreamed of since I finished high school and debuted into adulthood.

“Wait for me by the curb,” my mother said, her voice blaring from the phone even though I didn’t set her on speaker. “You need to eat better.” Her usual punctuation at the end of her orders.

So, I skipped down three flights of steps and headed toward the side of the apartment building to await my mother’s gift of the evening, salad in an á la chicken style, her insistent recipe to cure me of bad eating habits. At least it wasn’t chicken soup double-boiled till the bones melted, I consoled myself.

I hadn’t waited long when a vehicle careened round the corner. I heard it first, that high-pitched screech of brakes wearing thin when the driver rammed his foot against it. From the corner of my eye, even before I turned to face it, I saw the blue truck. It rounded the bend where Emerson Street met Ravenswood, tottered before it righted itself and headed straight at me.

I took three steps back, fell and scrambled to get back up as the vehicle like a giant bullet struck the sidewalk I had only seconds ago stood on. The driver must have lost control, but when he hit the sidewalk it slowed the vehicle enough so he could bridle his speed and manage the truck as he continued to careen down the street.

My mother arrived a half minute later but she had seen it all. Like superwoman, she leaped out of her twenty-year-old Mercedes and rushed toward me, all breathless and blonde hair disheveled.

“Are you all right?” She reached out to help me up.

“Yes, yes,” I said, brushing the dirt off my yoga pants.

“Crazy driver. Brie, I just don’t know about this business of you staying alone here like this.” She walked back to her white Mercedes, leaned in the open window, and brought out a casserole dish piled high with something green. Make that several shades of green.

I followed her, admittedly winded.“Seriously, Mom. It’s just one of those things. Mad drivers could happen anywhere I live.”

She gave me no end of grief as to what a bad idea it was for me to live alone like this even though she knew I was going to get a roommate.

“Mom, stop worrying,” I said.

“You’re asking me to stop being your mother, I hope you realize this.”

“I’ll find someone dependable by the end of the week, I promise.” No way I was going back to live at home. Not that I came from a bad home environment. But I had my reasons.

I had advertised on Craig’s List, despite my mother’s protests that only scum would answer “those kinds of ads.”

Perhaps there was some truth to Mother’s biases, but I wouldn’t exactly call Sarah McIntyre scum. If she was, what would that make me?

Sarah’s father had inherited the family “coal” money. Their ancestors had emigrated from Scotland (where else, with a name like McIntyre, right?) in the early 1800s and bought an entire mountain (I kid you not) in West Virginia. It was a one-hit wonder in that the mountain hid a coal fortune under it, and hence the McIntyre Coal Rights Company was born. This was the McIntyre claim to wealth, and also a source of remorse and guilt for Sarah, for supposedly dozens of miners working for them had lost their lives due to the business, most to lung cancer or black lung, as it was commonly called. Hazards of the occupation.

Buy Links:

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About the Author:

Emma Right is a happy wife and Christian homeschool mother of five living in the Pacific West Coast of the USA. Besides running a busy home, and looking after their five pets, which includes two cats, a  bunny and a Long-haired dachshund, she also writes stories for her children. She loves the Lord and when she doesn't have her nose in a book, she is telling her kids to get theirs in one. Right worked as a copywriter for two major advertising agencies and won several awards, including the prestigious Clio Award for her ads, before she settled down to have children.

Connect with the Author:

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